KARACHI, Oct 13: Pakistan is among nine Asian countries which have failed to control neonatal tetanus, a major cause of infant mortality in the country.
22,000 infants die of tetanus in Pakistan every year.
The world summit for children, in 1990, had set 1995 as the year of elimination of neonatal tetanus. So far 104 developing countries out of 161 have achieved the target. Some 27 countries, of which 18 are in Africa and nine in Asia, account for 90 per cent of the burden of the remaining neonatal tetanus.
Dr S. M. Afaq, Deputy Director of the National Institute of Child Health (NICH), Karachi, talking to PPI about causes of morbidity and drawing a comparison between Pakistan and other countries which have successfully overcame the problem, said deaths caused by neonatal tetanus had declined by 50pc between 1990-2000, but still 377,000 deaths occurred globally every year. Of this Pakistan’s share was 22,000, which he termed an alarming situation.
“In big cities, such as Karachi, every month 100 children die of the disease. Of them, 90pc are newborn delivered at home.”
“The majority of the victims hail from Landhi, Korangi, Malir, Banaras and Orangi Town. This is because of the fact that proper delivery care is only 30pc in Pakistan. Five girls were brought to the NICH from Memon Goth, Malir, who developed tetanus following traditional ear piercing practice. Three of them died. This happened because of ignorance on the part of parents.”
Dr Afaq said the incidence of tetanus was high in warm climates and months.
“Initial signs of tetanus is excessive unexplained crying for 5-15 days followed by refusal of feeds and apathy.”
Talking about immunization, he said widespread immunization against tetanus had controlled the disease to a great extent in most parts of the world, but in Pakistan a lot needed to be done. Maternal vaccination coverage between the ages of 15-45 was only 58pc, whereas under one year tetanus immunization coverage was only 59pc.
He contested the city government’s claim that their teams administered vaccine to around 1.1 million women, including 600,000 pregnant women, and said the claim was exaggerated and needed to be verified.
A survey revealed that such teams did not visit many apartment buildings for administration of anti-tetanus vaccine to women. Surprisingly, in congested areas of old Golimar most of the women said they were administered anti-tetanus vaccine by city government teams.—PPI