Ban on use of injections at mass scale demanded to prevent HIV spread

KARACHI: Infectious diseases experts investigating an HIV outbreak in Larkana epidemic have demanded authorities to immediately impose a “ban on use of injections at the clinics” run by General Practitioners (GPs)” in the province after it was learnt that majority of the persons infected with HIV were children aging between 2-5 years, who neither contracted the disease from their mothers nor through blood transfusion.

As many as 56 more persons, including 42 children were found infected with HIV in Ratodero area of Larkana on Saturday, Sindh health department officials told The News on Saturday, saying so far 393 people were found infected with the lethal virus including 312 children.

The health department officials said majority of them when interviewed said they received some medication through injections sometime during last one year. “During the interviews it emerged that reuse of syringes is the major cause of spreading the viral disease and we have asked the health department to immediately impose a ban on use of injections at clinics by general practitioners”, an Infectious Diseases (ID) expert tasked to investigate the recent outbreak in Ratodero area of Larkana, said.

The expert, who requested anonymity, claimed according to preliminary investigation by May 11, 2019, 393 people were found infected with the HIV, of whom 214 were children of two to five years, followed by 75 children between 6-15 years. “We also found 28 children infected with HIV who were less than of one year and screening of their parents revealed that their mothers were not infected and majority of them had also not received blood,” the expert said. He however underlined that "receiving some kind of medicine through injection is the most common intervention that could be blamed for the spread of HIV in Ratodero."

Suspecting that there could be more such pockets where large number of children could be infected with HIV, the Infectious Diseases expert said even the pharmacists and international experts are calling for an immediate ban on injections at the GP clinics.

The authorities should also take stern action against quacks, the ID expert said. Dr. Fatima Mir, an expert from Aga Khan University who is in Larkana and involved in treatment and management of HIV cases, also suspected that reuse of syringes, unnecessary use of injections and intravenous drips could be the major source of HIV infection and called for spreading awareness against needless use of injections and drips and insist on oral medicines.

Director General Health Sindh Dr. Masood Solangi while talking to The News confirmed that reuse of syringes has emerged as the major source of infection among children in Ratodero, Larkana and said a proposal to take action in this regard is under consideration. “At the moment, investigation is underway but infectious diseases experts and epidemiologists are suggesting that reuse of syringes could be the main source of spreading HIV”, Dr. Solangi maintained. Solangi also called for imposing ban on production of large injection vials by the pharmaceutical companies, saying quacks and untrained doctors use these large vials for extracting medicine for several patients and infect the medicine, which could also be source of spreading HIV, Hepatitis and other infectious diseases to the patients.

Meanwhile, a pediatric treatment center for newly infected children has been established by the Sindh health department at the Chandka Medical College (CMC) Larkana which was inaugurated by Sindh Secretary Health Saeed Awan on Friday. “We established this treatment center so these children could get Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) medicines timely instead of going to Civil Hospital Karachi”, Secretary Health Saeed Awan said and added that with the support from National Aids Control Program (NACP), medicines would soon be provided to the infected children so that they could live a normal life.

He said all the baseline tests as well as equipment to count CD4 T lymphocytes have been made available at the CMC Hospital Larkana and added that national and international experts are present in the area to train and educate local doctors while an awareness campaign to educate masses would be launched to apprise people of measures to prevent them from contracting infectious diseases.