Miscellaneous
Cash-strapped Saptari struggles to contain Swine, Hong Kong flus
Authorities in Saptari are struggling to contain Swine flu (H1N1) and Hong Kong flu (H3N2) outbreaks in Kanchanrup Municipality due to fund shortage.Abdhesh Kumar Jha
Authorities in Saptari are struggling to contain Swine flu (H1N1) and Hong Kong flu (H3N2) outbreaks in Kanchanrup Municipality due to fund shortage.
District Public Health Officer Niranjan Yadav said, “Though we have called health workers from other districts for their help in treatment, we are unable to provide food to them due to the shortage.” Yadav said he has notified the Ministry of Health at the centre and the Province 2 government about the problem several times.
The municipality has a shortage of medical masks and budget for the management of health workers.
“We don’t have medical masks here. It’s a risk for the health workers to work in the affected area without protection,” said Yadav.
Senior Auxiliary Health Worker Dambar Prasad Gupta, chief of the Health Section in Kanchanrup Municipality, said that the number of patients with fever are increasing daily. More than 428 new cases of fever were reported in a health camp conducted on Sunday alone, he said.
Meanwhile, Mayor of the municipality Basanta Mishra said they are facing problems to contain the disease due to lack of medical specialists.
“We have conducted health camps in various parts of the municipality but due to the lack of specialist doctors, health services have not been effective as desired,” said Mishra.
Four people have died and more than 2,500 people have been affected due to the outbreak of Swine and Hong Kong influenza (flu) in the last three weeks