PESHAWAR: The United Nations has asked the provincial government to activate its sectoral groups to deal with Covid-19 effectively as the WHO started getting mobile ventilators to be provided first time to the hospitals in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for strengthening care of the seriously-ill patients.

Initially, two mobile ventilators will be handed over to the Khyber Teaching Hospital (KTH) on Sunday (today) to boost the treatment of critical Covid-infected patients, according to officials.

They said the WHO had pledged more ventilators for intensive care of the patients in the province, but owing to increasing demand there was shortage in the international market. However, the WHO had placed orders and the supplies would start shortly.

The province has so far recorded 656 active patients and 25 deaths from coronavirus pandemic with Peshawar and Mardan the most endemic districts. The world health agency is strengthening healthcare services, initially in Peshawar which has most of the critical patients.

On Saturday, a meeting was held under director-general Provincial Disaster Management Authority with the UN agencies via video link, which was also attended by representative of the Pakistan Army and health department. It discussed the prevalent situation with regard to availability of medical logistics and the need for further assistance.

On this occasion, the health officials briefed the meeting about the preparedness and response regarding Covid-19 and asked for more medical supplies to strengthen the ICU facilities in the province in view of the increasing number of infected people.

The representatives of UN agencies briefed PDMA about the support being provided so far and the supplies to be made available shortly.

The UN also asked the PDMA to activate sectoral groups so that its different agencies could perform different tasks and deal with the situation more effectively. The PDMA, on the occasion, asked the WHO to share information regarding the assessment conducted of the isolation units of the province and fulfil the existing gaps required for timely response.

The WHO had also conducted assessment of over 33 health facilities in the province a few weeks ago to ascertain information about the available resources and the needs to plug the missing links and ensure effective care of the patients, said officials who attended the meeting.

They said guidelines regarding Covid-19 had also been issued to the health department. The UN health agency said it was starting trainings of rapid response teams initially in Peshawar, Mardan and Hangu from Monday (tomorrow) to train the healthcare providers on identification of suspected patients, collection of samples for testing and management of the confirmed patients in the province.

The meeting was informed that the WHO had conducted a three-day assessment of infection control and prevention at district headquarters hospitals of Karak, Bannu and Lakki Marwat besides Khalifa Gul Nawaz Teaching Hospital, Bannu, to ensure safety of the patients as well as healthcare professionals.

Published in Dawn, April 12th, 2020