PESHAWAR, March 16: Despite having been provided the needed funds three months ago, the provincial health department is yet to start registration of hepatitis C patients for receiving free treatment under the Benazir Health Support Programme (BHSP) for the purpose, sources said.

“Of the Rs500 million approved by the provincial cabinet for the treatment of hepatitis C patients Rs203 million has been released to the health department in December last year, but due to lack of homework the department is yet to register patients,” the officials said. They said that rest of the amount would be transferred to the department in next fiscal year.

They said that the department was finding it hard to register the Zakat-deserving patients across the province for free treatment. They said that the registration of patients should start as soon as possible to avoid lapsing of Rs203 million funds for this year.

Initially, it was planned that every district would be given Rs20 million to register hepatitis patients locally and treat them accordingly. Later, it was revealed that some of the districts like Chitral and Battagram had lesser patients compared to Mardan and Peshawar, which had the highest number of patients.

The officials said that the idea to allocate funds to the districts was later withdrawn and it was decided that all the patients already registered for Zakat would receive free treatment.

Under the programme, the health department plans to provide free diagnostic and treatment facilities to 70,000 hepatitis C patients in all the district headquarters hospitals besides Peshawars Khyber Teaching Hospital, Lady Reading Hospital, City Hospital and Hayatabad Medical Complex. The officials said that free medical camps would be organised in all the districts to screen people there for hepatitis B and C and then register them for free treatment.

The province has an estimated 1.1 million hepatitis patients, including 600,000 C, who required treatment. All the patients will be required to have duly attested Zakat documents to be eligible for free treatment.

They said that equipments for PCR test facility would be provided at the divisional level so that type of hepatitis could be determined at the initial stage of treatment. Presently, the PCR test facility is available in the province only at the Hayatabad Medical Complex, Peshawar.

“The PCR test decides if a patient really needs hepatitis C treatment. Without this test treatment could not be initiated,” the officials said and added that the basic screening facility for hepatitis would be extended to the rural health centres and tehsil headquarters hospitals.The officials said that the BHSP would provide treatment to the hepatitis C patients only and diagnostic facilities to both the B and C patients.

The incidence of hepatitis B has decreased due to the free vaccination programme launched by the Expanded Programme on Immunisation of the health department in 2002. An official said that the C type of the viral infection was increasing, which needed immediate measures.