Little relief from pandemic

Year sees increase in burden of disease on health facilities

KARACHI:

The year that was 2021 saw decline in pandemic fatalities but the threat continued with emergence of a new variant Omicron.

A representative body of the medical profession, Pakistan Medical Association (PMA), considers 2021 as unfortunate year not only for Pakistan but for the whole world due to pandemic of Covid-19.

Pakistan went through political and economic problems along with increasing number of health issues which have exuberated the burden of diseases on the healthcare system.

As per the body, instead of any improvement, things have gone from bad to worse in the healthcare sector.

Along with many other countries Pakistan is facing the fifth wave of Covid-19 in the form of Omicron. The tally of the confirmed cases for the year 2021 in Pakistan has reached to 815,661 which were 479,715 in 2020. The number of deaths due to covid-19 reported in 2021 has reached to 18,822 as compared with 10,105 deaths reported in 2020.

The increasing burden of Covid-19 proved to be more fatal for doctors. Till the end of 2021, at least 154 doctors and 32 paramedics have lost their lives due to Covid -19 in Pakistan. The government remained careless about the welfare of the families of the deceased doctors. They announced Shuhda Package for these families but never implemented it. The government even ignored the services of doctors while conferring civil awards of 2021 which caused desperation in the medical fraternity.

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In 2021, the government continued to raise the prices of medicine which further made it difficult for the poor people to get treatment of their diseases. Due to this price hike the medicine has gone out of the reach of the poor people of the country and even the middle class of our society feels burdened. Unfortunately the present government has now recently twelfth time increased the drug prices during its tenure. In such conditions when there is scarcity of health facilities at public hospitals, this increment of medicine prices is adding to the misery of the people.

At least 15 million people are affected with hepatitis B and C in Pakistan. Thousands of new patients are added every year due to lack of prevention, testing and treatment resources as well as poorly screened blood transfusion, improperly sterilized invasive medical devices and unsafe injections. Hepatitis B and C are several times more lethal viral diseases than the coronavirus infection and resulting in around 300 to 325 deaths daily in Pakistan. PMA believes main reason for the rising number of hepatitis C cases in Pakistan is the presence of a large number of quack doctors.

It is neither terrorism nor natural disasters but the unavailability of safe drinking water which leads to the highest number of deaths in Pakistan. The release of untreated industrial waste, unsafe sewage system, agriculture run-off and unplanned urbanization, has downgraded water quality over the years, especially in the big cities, depriving almost two-thirds of over 200 million Pakistanis of potable water. According to the UN, consumption of contaminated water which leads to several waterborne diseases contributes to 40 percent deaths nationwide every year.

It is estimated that, in Pakistan, 30% of all diseases and 40% of all deaths are due to poor water quality. Diarrhea, a waterborne disease, is reported as the leading cause of death in infants and children in Pakistan while every fifth citizen suffers from illness and disease caused by the polluted water.

The number of HIV/AIDS patients in Pakistan currently stands approximately at 203,000. The ratio of spread of HIV/AIDS cases in Pakistan is at 57 percent, similar to Philippines, which is very alarming. Out of big number of estimated positive cases only 25,000 cases are registered. HIV and Hepatitis B and C is mostly spread through reuse of injection syringes, unsafe blood transfusion and mishandling of hospital waste are the reasons behind spread of this disease and these reasons are unrestrained even today.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 1^st, 2022.