By Our correspondent
Professor and In-charge of Pathology Department at Hayatabad Medical Complex Peshawar Dr Fazal-e-Razak has said that there is need to take remedial measures for controlling growing prevalence of Hepatitis in Pakistan.
He speaking while inaugurating a private setup for conducting Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) screening and testing facilities for hepatitis diagnosis here in Rawalpindi. He said that in Pakistan most infections are transmitted from percutaneous or parenteral contact with inflected blood.
He said that hepatitis B and C virus infections are major health problem, which can result in acute and/or chronic liver diseases. “Infection may result in a chronic state, which may lead to Hepatocellular carcinoma or other chronic liver complications.”
On the occasion, other speakers stated that health is one of the most neglected areas in Pakistan. Infrastructure of health sector covers establishment of hospitals, dispensaries, basic health units, maternity child health care centres; and their staff composing doctors, dispensers, nurse, lady health visitors (LHV’s) and midwives.
The existing national network of health services in the public sector consists of 950 hospitals, 4,794 dispensaries, 561 rural health centres (RHCs) and 5,310 basic health units (BHUs). The total availability of beds in these health facilities is estimated to be 103,037. By all standards, this infrastructure is inadequate to meet the needs of about 160 millions people of Pakistan, they say.
The health experts further stated that a large number of problems and inadequacies in the health sector relate to the lack of adequate finances. The party explains the poor quality of health services, over-burdened outdoor departments, out of order equipment, insufficient medicines, and the relatively small number of beds, doctors and paramedic staff for patients in the hospitals. At the same time, however, there is a whole set of problems, which relates to the utilisation of resources that are made available. It is widely believed that whatever limited resources are allocated to the health sector they are not efficiently and optimally utilised.
They said that the only feasible means of preventing the spread and outcome of chronic hepatitis B infection is active vaccination. Unfortunately, a preventive vaccine for hepatitis C does not exist. Treatment options available revolve around anti-viral therapy and interferon injections, which are quite costly. Physicians need to adjust doses of interferon depending on the viral load that is determined through the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) testing, said experts.