Although no case of H1N1 virus infection has been confirmed in the State till date, the State Government has put the health officials on high alert to check spread of the deadly Swine flu disease in Jharkhand. The health authorities, however, have demanded 100 more Viral Transport Media (VTM) kits from the Centre to take on the disease.
“Earlier, we were given 100 VTM kits which have already been distributed among the other districts. We have demanded 100 more such kits so that it could be uniformly distributed across the State,” said the Director of State Integrated Disease Surveillance Program (ISDP) Dr Ramesh Prasad. Besides, protective equipment like gowns, masks, respirators and gloves for the paramedics have also been distributed to the district hospitals in ample numbers, he added.
According to Prasad, consignment of medicines for the treatment of Swine Flu patients was also likely to reach the State capital on Monday. “People in the State need not worry about the disease as over 15,000 files of Swine flu medicines have been made available for the State for now which will be further distributed among the other districts,” added Prasad.
The consignment of medicines includes 10,000 files of 75 ml, 5,000 files of 30 ml and 300 files of syrup bottles, he added. With the increasing number of cases of the disease detected in the other States of the country, several isolation units have been set up in Jharkhand to tackle the disease.
“We have set up 25 isolation units for Swine flu across the state at 22 Sadar Hospitals and 3 Medical Colleges,” said Prasad. No any case of Swine flu has been confirmed so far in the State. Earlier, one case had come to their notice but was later found to be negative in the tests reports.
“Presently, one patient of Dhurwa, who has returned from Rajasthan has been found to be suspected, which could be confirmed only after looking at the test results,” he added. The health officials across the State have also been alerted to intimate to their superiors if any patient with possible H1N1 infection is brought to their notice, Prasad said.
State health department, however, will have to bank on the laboratories outside the State to get the samples tested. The samples will be first sent to the labs in National Institute of Virology, Pune and National Center for Disease Control, New Delhi to get them tested.