Georgetown: The National Tuberculosis Programme (NTP), in observance of World TB Day today, held a health fair at the Mahaicony Hospital where residents in the community and its environs were able to access information on TB and other diseases, have medical check-ups, and counselling.
The National Blood. Transfusion Service and the National AIDS Programme Secretariat also participated in the fair on Saturday. Food for the Poor distributed food and other items to the residents. At the end of the exercise about 10 units of blood were collected.
World TB Day 2013 is being observed under the theme “I am stopping TB in my life time”.
Director of the National TB Programme, Dr. Jeetendra Mohanlall noted that a similar exercise was scheduled for Sophia today, another in Linden on Monday and on April 6another health fair will be held in the avenue on Main street; on the eve of World Health Day. The Regions are also hosting their own awareness activities in observance of World TB Day.
The information provided during the health fairs are intended to increase citizens’ knowledge about the signs and symptoms, the fact that TB is preventable, treatable and curable and this will in turn reduce the stigma and discrimination foisted on people suffering with the disease.
Dr. Mohanlall emphasised that the intention of the health fairs is to reach out to the communities in keeping with the TB Day theme, and in so doing the NTP is seeking more partnerships with families, communities and civil and corporate society.
Fighting TB in Guyana’s prison system
The Ministry of Health through the establishment and function of the NTP has taken proactive steps to alleviate the effects of this disease. In this regard, the NTP seeks to provide high quality health care and support services to those who are affected by TB.
While this can be a challenge, the NTP has been successful in its efforts, and this is most evident in that during the past six months there were no reports of new TB cases in the prison system. This is a direct consequence of aggressive and sustained work being conducted by the NTP.
At a High Level Meeting hosted jointly by the Ministry of Health and the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) regarding human rights and the delivery of health care to people who are incarcerated, attention was placed on the presence of tuberculosis in Guyana’s prisons.
Guyana was also applauded for its efforts in providing TB care and treatment to prisoners.
The objectives of the High Level Meeting were to examine current mechanisms to maintain health in prisons in Guyana, discuss the challenges and gaps faced in the country in the context of health in prisons, present an overview of the recent activities developed by PAHO in the context of health and human rights in prisons and identify the next steps to be taken in order to develop joint activities engaging all relevant ministries to improve health and human rights conditions, in line with PAHO Resolution CD50.R8.
Some of the challenges faced in controlling TB in the prisons include ownership of the TB programme by the prison authority, overcrowding at the main prison, lack of health personnel in the prison, infection control measures at the main prison (ventilation of isolation unit), difficulty transporting inmates for investigations and inmates are lost following their discharge.
Nevertheless, there have been several interventions to address the disease some of which are hiring of a DOTS supervisor for the prisons. There is a case detection – respiratory symptomatic register at all facilities.
The DOTS programme exists at all prisons, isolation areas are at the facilities, the enabler’s programme includes inmates diagnosed with TB, mass screening is done periodically and a proposal was made for the procurement of mobile unit.
The NTP’s successes in the prison system were followed by the receipt of additional funding made available by Global Fund. The provision of approximately US $2.1M is for Phase Two of a Global Fund grant for which its renewal will see continued funding until September 30, 2015 and will be used to support the Health Ministry in its fight against TB.
The partnership with Global Fund has seen the endorsement of two grants in 2005 and 2010, respectively. The first phase of the 2010 grant was recently completed. Such support given by Global Fund and other agencies has ensured Guyana achieved significant gains in the fight against TB.
Data has shown that new TB cases increased from 75 percent in 2005 to 90 percent in 2012, and the mortality rate declined from 13 deaths in every 100,000 in 2005 to a significantly reduced rate of 9 deaths in every 100,000 in 2012.
Additionally, due to increased focus on improved case detection the incident rate of TB has steadily increased from 87 percent in 2005 to 96 percent in 2012, and there has also been a significant increase in TB cases with a recorded HIV result from 70 percent in 2005 to 96 percent in 2012.
Global Fund has been supporting the TB fight for over seven years and is the NTP’s main partner which supported the expansion of the DOTS programme in all 10 administrative regions. The decentralisation of the TB services has seen the establishment of 18 service sites in Guyana.
An estimated 14 million people worldwide are infected with active TB which is a disease of poverty affecting mainly young adults in their most productive years. In 2009 there were 9.4 million new cases of TB and 1.7 million deaths, including 380,000 deaths from TB among people with HIV. The vast majority of deaths from TB are in the developing world.
The latest data released by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in November 2010 show that the number of new cases continues to fall globally and in five of the six WHO regions. The exception is Southeast Asia, where the incidence remains stable. In many countries TB prevalence is declining. Worldwide, deaths from TB fell by 35 percent between 1990 and 2009.
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