‘92,000 children under five die of pneumonia annually in Pakistan’

LAHORE:Leading paediatricians have stressed the need for vaccination to fight pneumonia, a deadliest disease among children under five. In a statement to mark upcoming Pneumonia Day on Tuesday (today), they said that 92,000 children under five die of pneumonia annually in Pakistan.

“According to the World Health Organisation estimates, pneumonia accounts for 16pc of the total child deaths making it the leading killer of children less than 5 years of age. Globally, pneumonia accounts for more than 920,000 deaths among children under 5 and Pakistan is among top 5 countries, which accounts for 99pc of childhood pneumonia cases,” said Dr Naeem Zafar, Member Central Executive Committee, Convener Child Rights Committee PPA. “Provision of health and prevention of diseases is the basic right of every child. It is the responsibility of state, society, and parents to provide this right to the child,” he added.

Describing the disease, Dr Haroon Hamid, Professor of Paediatric Medicine at King Edward Medical College, said, “Pneumonia is a form of acute respiratory infection that affects the lungs. When an individual has pneumonia, the alveoli (small sacs in lungs which fill with air when a healthy person breathes) are filled with pus and fluid, which makes breathing painful and limits oxygen intake.” “Vaccines are considered second only to clean drinking water in reducing infectious diseases. It is very unfortunate that a preventable and treatable illness is claiming so many precious lives,” he added.

“Children under five with severe cases of pneumonia may struggle to breathe, with their chests moving in or retracting during inhalation (known as ‘lower chest wall in drawing’). Young infants may suffer convulsions, unconsciousness, hypothermia, lethargy and feeding problem,” Dr Hamid added.

Dr Tahir Masood, Member National Immunization Technical Advisory group, said, “Preventing children from pneumonia is the best strategy to reduce sickness and death from pneumonia.”

“We are very fortunate that Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccine (pneumonia vaccine) has been introduced in Pakistan’s EPI program in October2012, and this achievement has made Pakistan become the first South Asian country to include PCV in its national immunization programme,” he added.