Govt not serious about "Health for All"

Kathmandu, June 21 (RSS): Discussions on the appropriation heads pertaining to the Health Ministry under the Appropriation Bill-2057 began at the meeting of the House of Representatives the other day.

Netra Lal Shrestha of the Rastriya Prajatantra Party and Dr. Banshidhar Mishra of the CPN-UML presented two separate proposals for reducing Rs 100 from the amount under Apropriation Bill-2057 of the Health Ministry.

Taking part at the discussion on the proposal for reducing the expenses, N Shrestha of the RPP said HMG has not performed as per the slogan of health for all by 2000, the programmes targeted by the Ninth Plan have not been effective, and the rural people have been dying due to lack of basic health services.

MP Shrestha said the children in the remote and poverty stricken areas have been dying due to lack of 'Jeewanjal" and other rehydration treatment, the average age of the residents of Mugu District is only 25, no office has been established even after the construction of the building of the dimmure health office in Salyan District 10 years ago and the people in the villages have to rely on the faith healers for lack of doctors and medicines.

He demanded arrangements of health workers for postmortem in each districts, check on commercialisation in the health sector and misue of medicines sent to the district.

Presenting the proposal for reducing expenses, Dr. Mishra accused the government of unheeding to national and international commitments and of failure to spend even the appropriated budget in the health sector.

He called for equipping the local health institutions, creating a congenial atmosphere for the doctors to go to the rural areas, making the accounts of the health institutions more transparent, and equal facilities for the employees and doctors of various institutions.

He accused the Ministry of being involved in taking commission while providing health services to the people.

Homnath Dahal of the Nepali Congress drew attention towards making arrangements for potable drinking water as 80 per cent of the diseases are attributed to water, the works of the regional health directorate and the district public health offices be made effective, and attention given to the problems of drinking water in the capital.

He appreciated the government of being successful in such challenging work as administering of polio drops.

Ghanendra Basnet of the CPN-UML expressed resentment over negligence in government hospitals, no attention given to the disorders of essential equipment in the hospitals, situation in Bhojpur district hospital under which doctors have to be brought from Biratnagar to conduct postmortem even when there are posts for three doctors in the hospital, situation created under which peons have to distribute medicines in the health posts.

Narayan Prakash Saud of Nepali Congress drew the attention to towards the lack of health workers in the hospitals and the health posts. Arrangements should be made for doctors in the district to end the situation of taking a doctor from the centre for conducting postmortem in the hilly districts. He requested the government for the resolution of problems that the people of Kanchanpur have been suffering from diseases like encephalitis, meningitis and Malaria.

Jagadish Prasad Saha of the CPN-UML said attention should be given to the lack of equipment like x-ray in the government hospitals, doctors should be available as per the posts in the hospitals, and the capacity of the Rajbiraj hospital be extended to 50 beds. Stating that only basic treatment facilities are available at Rajbiraj due to lack of medicines and doctors even though it is a zonal Hospital, he complained on the curtailing of quota of a ayurvedic hospital in Saptari.

Buddhiman Tamang of the RPP said 15 per cent of the total budget should be allocated for health and emphasis should be given to ayurved hospitals. As the medium level health workers of the district are headquarters-oriented they should be sent to the villages, he said, adding the problems should be solved as the medicines in the health posts and sub-health posts are of substandard in quality, less in quantity and not reaching the places in time. He drew the attention of the government towards the situation under which budget to build a primary health centre in Salyantar of Dhading district is going to be freezed because of delay in sanctioning the budget.

NC's Ram Kumar Chaudhary, Laxman Prasad Mehta and Hridayaram Thani expressed the view that the government should given due attention towards providing essential number of doctors and modern equipment to health centres and sub-centres, increase the post of doctors in Sunsari district hospital, run district health centres and health posts in an effective manner and to wipe out scarcity of beds and doctors in hospitals.

RPP's Brijesh Kumar Gupta said the programmes of the government do not meet its target of extending health services to everyone by 2000, public awareness programmes should be carried out to control the population growth and doctors should be encouraged to work in the remote areas.

CPN-UML's Sushila Nepal, Yadav Bahadur Rayamajhi and Bijaya Subba spoke of the need to introduce effective programmes to control smoking and drinking, family planning should be developed as a family welfare, programme and attention should be given towards improving the condition of the district and zonal hospitals.

MPs Shiva Kumar Basnet and Haribhakta Ahikari of Nepali Congress said health education should be expanded at the people's level, ayurvedic treatment system should be promoted, emphasis should be given to the effective implementation of the budget allocated for the health sector and that liquor and cigarattes should be prohibited inside Singha Durbar.

CPN-UML's Dan Bahadur Chaudhary and Tilkumar Meyangbo demanded that the government improve the conditions of health post and health centres, give special emphasis towards fulfilling the target to providing health services to everyone by 2000 and build primary health centres buildings in the country.

CPN-UML's Sherdhan Rai and Shiva Bahadur Deuja complained that the health situation is miserable in the country, health posts have been left unmanaged, there is a lack of safe drinking water and the budget is silent on providing health services to the poor. He spoke of the need to free the health sector from politics and to set up a district hospital in Kavre district.

NC's Ramesh Datta Lekhak, Rajendra Kharel and Ramchandra Tiwari said budgetary allocations made in the health sector for establishing health posts in the villages are positive aspects of the budget.

They stressed the need to make provisions requiring doctors to mandatorily serve in rural areas, provide health services to the people across the Mahakali River, allocate Rs 10 million for drinking water management at Bir Hospital, continue programme to check HIV and provide medicines for snake bites in every health post and sub-health post.

Shankarnath Sharma and Durga Likhan of the CPN-UML said only a limited number of people have access to health services, the "Health for All" slogan is yet to be translated into action, district hospitals are in a doldrums and there is only one doctor at Dhankuta Hospital.

NC's Narayan Sharma Paudel noted that the government should serious to ensure that no one loses his or her life due to deprivation and special programmes should be devised for sending doctors to the villages.

CPN-UML's Bir Bahadur Lama observed that the budget appropriated for the health sector is nothing more than an eyewash and the health policy is against the national interests.

Sabitri Bogati, Shiva Raj Joshi, Shankar Prasad Pandey and Shiva Prasad Humagain of Nepali Congress stressed the need to pay special attention to further reduce maternity and child mortality rate, establish one maternity home each in all five development regions, improve the condition of Singha Durbar Baidyakhana, produce medicines in the country by processing available medicinal herbs, fix 30 years as the service period of doctors, provide 25 per cent discount on the treatment cost for helpless and elderly people in government hospitals, establish a government hospital in Kavre and make necessary arrangements for providing postmortum facility in the district hospitals.

CPN-UML's Yog Narayan Yadav, Nara Bahadur Hamal and Chandra Bahadur Shahi complained about the absence of doctors in the district hospitals and indifference towards the construction of the proposed 15-bed hospital in Mugu and stressed the need to establish a communicable diseases hospital in Janakpur in view of the regular outbreak of Kala Azar and Malaria in the Terai belt, make arrangements for providing free treatment to poor people, establish more ayurved hospitals, make it mandatory for doctors to be present where they are posted and supply medicines to the Karnali area on time.

Nara Bahadur Budhathoki, Omprasad Ojha, Som Prasad Pandey, Ratna Prasad Neupane and Gorakh Bahadur Bogati spoke about the very poor health services in the villages and lack of preservation and management of medicinal plants available in the country and said that the arrangements should be made for the doctors to be compulsorily present in rural areas, make the health policy people-oriented, bring the already established district hospital in Jumla into operation and provide adequate medicines to the health posts and sub health posts in the villages.

KMC, EC conduct socio-economic survey

BY A STAFF REPORTER

Kathmandu, June 21: Kathmandu Valley Mapping Programme, a joint effort of Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) and European Commission (EC), is conducting a massive socio-economic survey of the residents of the Kathmandu urban area In its bid to strengthen KMC in servie delivery and effective urban management, the Programme targets to cover almost twelve thousand households for the survey. This is stated in a press release issued by KVMP, today.

Besides the survey, the Programme also planning to implement Addressing System from the coming fiscal year in all wards of the Kathmandu MetropolitanCity. For this a detail work plan has already been prepared and is in the process of obtaining approval from KMC and Ministry of Physical Planning and Construction.

This was informed at the Project Co-ordination Committee meeting of the KVMP recently. Mayor of Kathmandu Municipal City (KMC) Keshav Sthapit chaired the meeting.

While informing about the progress made by the Programme, National Co-Director P.S. Joshi highlighted on various aspects of the Project. "Besides enhancing the capabilities of the KMC, the Programme also expects to promote the reduction in gender inequality and support opportunities for disadvantaged groups and the urban poor by carrying out specially focused activities," Joshi pointed out, the press release said

The Programme has already initiated discussions with the major stakeholders of the Programme's Mapping and GIS component and local consultants are preparing reports on them," Joshi said. Tenders for necessary mapping and audio-visual equipments, computers and other instruments were also called and they are in the process of evaluation, he informed.

Addressing the meeting Mayor Sthapit highlighted on the need of joint effort between the KMC and the KVMP to address the emerging problems due to the rapid urbanization of the Kathmandu Valley.

All department heads of the KMC, KVMP's European Co-Director Dr. V.E. Pareto and other officials of the Programme also participated at the meeting.

Use of pesticides increases in Rauthat

Rautahat, June 21 (RSS): Farmers here who are more attracted toward cash crops than cereal crops have been using pesticides to a greater extent in their vegetable cultivation.

According to the district administration office, Rautahat, about 60 percent of the farmers here use pesticides.

However, the consumption of vegetables within a few days after spraying with pesticides may have an adverse impact on public health.

Such vegetables are suitable for consumption only 31 days after the pesticide spraying and the office is launching an awareness drive among farmers in the near future, office chief Raj Narayan Das said.

Meanwhile, a 2-day soil test camp organised joinly by the regional soil test laboratory Birgunj and the agricultural development office, Rautahat concluded here recently.

'Economic uplift can control TB'

BY A STAFF REPORTER

Kathmandu, June 21: The socio-economic development programmes need to be launched effectively along with medical treatment to eradicate the tuberculosis (TB) from Nepal, Japanese Ambassador to Nepal Mitsuaki Kojima said.

"If the development programmes to uplift the socio-economic condition of people in Nepal is undertaken simultaneously along with the programme of eradicating TB, the end result will be effective in controlling the dreaded disease that threatens many human lives" , said Ambassador Kojima, addressing the participants of a talk programme, " Japan's Experience in TB Control", hosted by the Embassy of Japan, Tuesday.

Kojima said that Japan too had faced the same problem during the country's industrialisation period in the early twentieth century but Japan launched the development programme in its rural area to get rid of the disease.

Tuberculosis, a serious global health problem, is a social problem as it undermines the ability of millions of people to work in their most economically productive years, the ambassador said.

Ambassador Kojima said that the Directly Observed Treatment (DOT) system is effective method to attack TB in the country which needs to be expanded along with the programmes to eradicate malnutrition from the people below the poverty line.

At the programme, the chief advisor of National Tuberculosis Centre, Dr. Katsunori Osuga, spoke about his experience he gathered during his three and half years of stay in Nepal.

Dr. Osuga who is returning Japan's Tokyo based Tuberculosis Research Centre soon was deputed in Nepal under the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA).

Dr Osuga while sharing his experience with the participants said that out of one hundred thousand infected with lung TB people, thirty-five die.

He said that 44,000 new cases are found in Nepal every year and 8,000 to 11,000 adults who are engaged in active social activities die of the disease annually. However only fifty out of 100,000 TB patients come to health centre for check-up.

He said that the rate of drug resistance is growing in 1.7 per cent TB bacillus that needs to be study closely.

Dr. Osuga said that the DOTs method of treatment has been in practice since 1996 and with the help of this method 92 per cent positive successful result has been achieved currently.

Dr Osuga, who has completed his tenure with the JICA's TB project in Nepal stressed the need for DOTs to reach to the poor and different communities of Nepal to achieve the effectiveness of TB control programme in Nepal.

Dr. Osuga further said that the price of TB drugs in Nepal is relatively cheaper but the difficulty in procurement and distribution process of the essential drugs makes it somewhat expensive.

At the programme, Ken Hasegawa, Resident Representative of JICA, while delivering vote of thanks, said that as the present JICA's TB project in Nepal, the next phase will probably be started in the month of December, this year. At the function, Economist Dr. Bam Dev Sigdel had commented on Dr. Osuga's lecture.