Unprepared Sindh issues swine flu alert

Karachi
With a swine flu outbreak in India, the Sindh government issued an alert on Friday directing hospitals to set up isolation wards and the air and sea ports to prevent the entry of any suspected patient, but practically the province seems nowhere prepared to deal with the disease.
Swine flu, or H1N1 influenza, has claimed nearly a 1,000 lives in neighbouring India.
“We have issued guidelines to the airport authorities and told them to keep a watch on suspected patients coming directly or indirectly from India,” health secretary Iftikhar Shallwani told The News.
“The suspected patients will be isolated and quarantined until they are checked by doctors,” he added.
Besides, all major state-run hospitals in Karachi, including the Jinnah, Civil and Abbasi Shaheed, and the rest of the province have been told to prepare for the disease and set up isolation wards.
However, the secretary conceded that there were no public sector swine flu diagnostic facilities in the province.
“The samples either have to be sent to the NIH Islamabad or to a private hospital in Karachi,” he added.
The secretary said the alert was a precautionary step but realistically there was hardly any chance of a swine flu patient entering the country without being detected.

Completely unprepared
Medical experts including virologists told The News that the province’s health authorities were not even prepared to deal with gastroenteritis and other water-borne diseases, let alone an airborne infection like swine flu.
“Swine flu is an airborne, contagious disease and it spreads rapidly,” said Dr Qaiser Sajjad, an office-bearer of the Pakistan Medical Association.
“It is a lethal disease with symptoms like the common flu and within a few days, patients die of respiratory arrest and other complications,” he added.
Dr Sajjad said the doctors and paramedics at public hospitals were neither trained to handle swine flu cases nor did they have preventive kits to interact with the patients.
He added that the measures that could be taken for swine flu prevention included drinking plenty of water, sleeping well and eating vegetables and fruit to increase immunity.
“The biggest problem in Pakistan, including Sindh, is the lack of awareness about the disease, both among the masses and the doctors.”
An official at the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital said it would take some time for the medical facility to fully comply with the government’s instructions.
“We have received the swine flu alert from the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation as the hospital falls under the administrative control of the civic body,” said Dr Naeemuddin. “We are preparing ourselves to handle swine flu cases.”
A Jinnah hospital official, requesting anonymity, told The News that the hospital had no masks or kits to attend to swine flu patients. “Besides, our doctors and paramedics aren’t even trained to handle these cases.”