Health Minister raps foreign agencies

Nadira Gunatilleke

Presently some International agencies are spreading totally inaccurate information regarding medical facilities provided by the Government for the people fleeing into cleared areas from the LTTE held territory but the Healthcare and Nutrition Ministry has already provided all required medical facilities for the displaced people and is ready to provide all required medical facilities for any number of people arriving in the cleared areas, Healthcare and Nutrition Minister Nimal Siripala De Silva said.

Addressing the media at his office yesterday Minister de Silva said that the Ministry does not need any assistance from foreign countries to provide the required medical facilities for the displaced people but is willing to accept if any foreign country offers any assistance.

When a request made from the ICRC to bring patients to cleared areas to provide better medical facilities, the patients were shifted further inside the uncleared areas. The Ministry has already ordered the annual drug quota which for the entire population in the North and East and therefore no drug shortage exists at the moment. The Government has sent its full requirement of drugs to the North even during the time LTTE held the entire area, the Minister added.

Minister de Silva thanked all the trade unions and the GMOA for assisting to send health staff to the North. More than the required number of doctors, nurses, dispensers, pharmacists, MLTs and all the other health professionals have already been sent to serve in the Vavuniya and Cheddikulam hospitals and all camps.

103 students in the Vavuniya Nurses Training School have also been deployed in the camps to take care of patients. 380 doctors will be sent to serve in the North and East shortly.

Air conditioned containers will be provided for health staffs to stay until complete accommodation facilities in permanent buildings are made available for them.

The doctors, nurses, midwives and other health professionals who come to cleared areas with the public will be paid and employed to provide medical facilities to the people. So far four doctors and 2 midwives have arrived with the people.

According to the Minister, not even a single Malaria patient been detected from the camps and no outbreak of any type of disease have been reported.

Apart from general medical assistance, vaccination, blood testing for Malaria and mobile dental unit, mobile laboratory several other facilities have been provided to the camps. "This is similar to the situation when Sri Lanka was hit by the 2004 tsunami and even during that major disaster no outbreak of disease reported from refugee camps."

Health centres have been set up and health staff transported to these camps by ambulances every morning. They serve in the camps the whole day. Thriposha, nutrition supply has been provided for all the people living in camps without considering their age, health or any other factor.

Special care has been made available for pregnant mothers to obtain medical facilities from hospitals. Ten ambulances have been allocated for the camps. The Ministry has already sent 15 doctors, 110 nurses, 2 lorries of drugs and several other requirements.