PESHAWAR, July 21: The NWFP Health Department has launched a probe into alleged irregularities and misappropriation of funds in the Safe Blood Transfusion Cell of the Aids Control Programme at the Lady Reading Hospital.

The probe is being conducted on the basis of a letter alleging large-scale irregularities by the provincial programme manager of the Safe Blood Transfusion Cell, received by Dr Amir Rehman Jadoon, Coordinator of the Safe Blood Transfusion Cell of the Provincial Aids Control Programme.

The complaint had been lodged on December 12 last year, which had prompted the health department to initiate a probe into the matter. However, Dr Jadoon lodged another complaint with the Provincial Aids Control Programme asking it to appoint some senior officials to ensure an impartial probe into the matter, saying that the officials appointed to hold an inquiry happened to be juniors to the programme manager and some were his students and even close friends.

Citing a monitoring report of all blood banks in the NWFP from November 2004 to November 2005 on the directives of the director-general health services, NWFP, the four-page letter said that the government had been purchasing 80,000 diagnostic kits each for HIV/Aids and hepatitis per year but 22 of the 36 public sector blood banks in the province were yet to start screening services for HIV/Aids and hepatitis due to lack of supply of kits to them by the provincial programme manager of the Safe Blood Transfusion Cell.

It said that at least 20,000 kits each for HIV/Aids and hepatitis were misused annually. There is neither a proper record regarding the consumption of screening kits nor proper audit was ever carried out. The distribution process of these kits to the blood banks had been made so cumbersome that the officials concerned were reluctant to follow the procedure, it added.

Dr Jadoon has informed that of the 300,000 disposable syringes purchased by the Safe Blood Transfusion Cell two years ago, 1,50,000 had been found expired at the store of the Lady Reading Hospital. The syringes purchased had only one and a half years of life. During monitoring, 22,000 expired syringes were found in the district headquarters hospitals of Swabi and Swat.

He said that the medical superintendents of these hospitals were a witness to it. Most of the blood banks do not use syringes for screening purposes because they collect blood directly in the bags from which screening was done.

The syringes could have met the needs of the entire province for six years, it said.