All Congo Fever Patients Are Being Kept In Quarantine.

The adviser to Chief Minister Punjab on Health Kh Salman Rafique has constituted a special team consisting of senior clinicians of Health Department after Congo virus surfaced in Bahawalpur and the team would furnish its report after examining the situation.
According to the report, all contacts of Congo fever patients are being kept in quarantine. These people would remain under surveillance during the incubating period of Congo virus so as to control the spread of the disease. Experts of the World Health Organisation (WHO), doctors and epidemiologists have started taking precautionary measures on the spot. Furthernore, Kh Salman Rafique presided over an important meeting in this connection on Friday which was attended by Secretary Specialised Healthcare and Medical Education Najam Ahmad Shah, Special Secretary Dr Sajid Mahmood Chauhan, Additional Secretary (Tech) Dr Salman Shahid, Director General Health Dr Mukhtar Hussain Syed and the officers of Communicable Disease Control Programme.
The DG health informed the meeting that a student nurse of DHQ Hospital, Lodhran, was admitted in BVH, Bahawalpur, with complaint of severe abdominal pain and was operated but she did not survive. After four days, surgeon Dr Saghir who had operated the nurse, was admitted in a private hospital of Karachi with symptoms of hemorrhagic fever which was later diagnosed as Congo fever. After that a house surgeon also developed the same symptoms.
Moreoverover, the meeting was informed that after confirmation of Congo fever in both the doctors, an alert had been issued in district Lodhran and Bahawalpur. Health teams have quarantined all contacts of the student nurse and the doctors. Moreover, medical teams of WHO and Health Department are monitoring the situation and blood samples of the isolated people have been sent to the National Institute of Health (NIH), Islamabad.
The Health Department has advised doctors and nurses to wear Personal Protective Gears (PPG), which are available in hospital in sufficient numbers, during the treatment of Congo virus patients, if any.
Kh Salman Rafique directed the DG health to be vigilant and keep an eye on the situation. He said the all-out efforts should be made to control the disease according to the SOPs of WHO. The Health Department has also approached the Livestock Department authorities and they have been asked to start an immediate campaign to eliminate ticks from cattle and livestock. THE NATION