KARACHI, Aug 8: Speakers at the inaugural session of a seminar on Friday urged the government to strengthen its vaccination programme through which the beneficiaries could receive treatment of infectious diseases at a friction of the otherwise unaffordable cost.

The three day seminar on Vaccine Production and Utilization in Developing Countries: Issues, Prospects and Implications for Pakistan has been organized jointly by the Aga Khan University and the COMSTECH.

They stressed the need for creating awareness in masses regarding the importance of the vaccines with reference to some places where medicalteams are not allowed to vaccinate children.

Federal Minister for Health Mohammad Nasir Khan on the occasion urged the private sector to come forward and join hands with the government to ensure better health care to the masses. It is a gigantic task that the government could not accomplish all alone, he declared.

He said that the National Vaccine Development and Production Task Force had already been formed with the task to identify problems and put forward its recommendations. The government, he added, would benefit from the recommendations while chalking out a strategy in the field.

He pointed out that vaccines have miraculous effects in fighting out infectious diseases. Millions of people still die of those infectious diseases for which either vaccines have not yet been discovered or the available ones are not reliable or affordable for the patients.

Referring to the ongoing process of removing barriers in the international travel and trade, which is aimed at transforming the Earth into a global village, the minister observed that infectious diseases of a particular country/region moved to the other and spread swiftly. In this situation, everyone must have easy access to vaccines if safety is to be ensured, he added.

The health minister reiterated the government’s commitment to continue the programme launched in 1978 to immunize children under the age of five against six vaccine-preventable diseases and their mothers against the neonatal tetanus.

Mr Nasir Khan said that the federal government had increased the health budget by 35 per cent — from Rs3.2 billion to Rs4.2 billion — and that the governments of Sindh and Punjab had also followed suit. Foreign donors have contributed US$35 million this year for various programmes, he added.

Speaking on the occasion, Dr John Clemens of the International Vaccine Institute said that if produced locally, not only the cost could be brought down, but the vaccines’ quality in terms of effectiveness could also be improved.

He said that vaccines were an integral component of the public health programmes around the world and with good vaccine coverage, many diseases had been controlled effectively.

Acting provost of the university Dr David Other said that with better vaccine coverage, the local infant mortality rate could be brought down drastically.

Dr Zulfiqar A. Bhutta, Dr Anwar Nasim and Dr Anwar Siddiqui wereamong those who spoke at the seminar which is being attended by guests from the United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Spain, Iran, Sudan, Egypt, Cuba and other countries.