Where are the vaccines?

In Swabi, two people have died and six people have tested positive for H1N1 virus

Reports of swine flu surfacing again this year in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) have been doing the rounds, but disturbingly, there are no vaccines available for treatment or prevention of the disease in the province. So far, nearly 30 suspected cases of the virus have been reported in K-P, while in Swabi alone, two people have died and six people have tested positive for the H1N1 virus. The respiratory disease usually begins to spread around December and lasts until February and March. Its spread is now a predictable and preventable occurrence, but we seem to be ill-prepared years after it first surfaced.

According to the provincial health department of K-P, vaccines for the disease dried up a long time ago and patients and other people at risk have been told to find the antiviral medication through their own efforts. The health department says the Word Heath Organisation (WHO) is responsible for providing the vaccines, while the WHO says it has not been asked to supply the vaccine. Amidst this bureaucratic tussle and confusion, it is the patients who are suffering. Once again, it will be the poor who will be affected the most, as they mainly rely on government hospitals for medication. It is clear that the provincial government should have been better prepared. Every life lost because of a preventable virus is essentially the health department’s responsibility. Since 2009, swine flu has been reported in this region with regularity. Earlier this year, 1,500 people died of the virus in India. In Iran, nearly 33 people have died of swine flu this month as the epidemic spread in the provinces of Kerman and Sistan-Baluchestan, and there are concerns that it can spread to Tehran. While Iran has blamed Pakistan for the spread of the disease, at this stage it is difficult to ascertain where it originated. Be that as it may, we need to realise that the virus is a contagious one and its spread in neighbouring countries should be a concern for authorities here as well. The general callousness and neglect that health facilities in Pakistan suffer through will not help in controlling the virus.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 17^th, 2015.

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