KARACHI, June 19: Sindh Health Minister Shabbir Ahmed Qaimkhani has said that there were at least 5,348 hepatitis patients in the province and the number of patients was multiplying with an alarming pace.

He was speaking at the launch of Prime Minister’s National Programme for Hepatitis Control and Prevention on Sunday night. Acting Governor Syed Muzaffar Hussain and Federal Health Secretary Anwer Mehmood also addressed the function.

Referring to a report of the World Health Organisation that around 170 million people were affected with hepatitis worldwide, the health minister said that the disease was spreading at an alarming pace in Pakistan, particularly in rural areas of Sindh, due to lack of awareness. He said that only in Mirpurkhas there were 1,266 hepatitis patients.

He announced that the Sindh government would soon set up excellence centres for hepatitis patients in Karachi and Larkana so that better healthcare facilities could be provided to the masses.

Mr Qaimkhani urged the citizens to use water only after boiling. He said that vaccination against hepatitis for children under age of five years was included in the Expended Program of Immunisation. He urged parents to get their children vaccinated against hepatitis.

Syed Muzaffar Shah urged public representatives at the local bodies as well as provincial and national assemblies to serve as catalyst in combating the preventable disease.

He said no programme could succeed lest its salient features were taken to grass root levels and community was involved. “You must make common people realise the significance of interventions and also motivate them to opt for these,” he said.

He referred to invariable presence of doctors in every small town and village of Sindh, including his hometown Umerkot, where for a population of 150,000 people, there were 300 doctors, who he said could be involved in sensitising the masses about prevention of hepatitis.

The acting governor regretted that despite passage of more than 50 years people were yet exposed to waterborne ailments besides other severe health conditions which could be largely avoided.

Focussing on Hepatitis A and E spread through contaminated water, he said that people when properly sensitised and if actually involved through influential segments as those representing them in decision making bodies, doctors and community leaders could definitely have a better living conditions and quality life.

Referring to the SAARC Parliamentarians Conference on Prevention of HIV/AIDS hosted by Sindh only a few months back, Muzaffar Shah said such meetings were effective source of meaningful involvement of the masses in combating diseases in an organised manner.

“We the public representatives owe it to our people, mobilizing them, getting across them the message that a campaign is launched for their benefit and they are to be actual part of its,” he said.

He said that prevention of hepatitis was a challenge to be accepted by all and this message would have to be carried to the masses in villages, small towns and urban slums.

Federal Health Secretary Anwer Mehmood told the moot that the Prime Minister had initially allocated Rs2.75 billion for prevention of the hepatitis.—PPI/APP