Pneumonia infects 3,000 Badakhshan residents in 2 months

FAIZABAD (Pajhwok): Local health (December 22 to January 22), with eight people dying in northeastern Badakhshan province.

Dr. Mohammad Yatim Tamim, a pediatrician in Civil Hospital in Faizabad, the provincial capital, told Pajhwok Afghan News that more than 2,120 people suffering from respiratory diseases visited the hospital between December 22 and January 22, compared to 880 patients of the kind in November 2019.

He said more than 1,700 people infected with pneumonia visited the hospital during the past two months and they were treated and discharged from the hospital.

Six children and two elderly men lost their lives due to severity of the diseases during the two months in the province.

About deaths caused by pneumonia and respiratory diseases, he said, “Badakhshan is a mountainous province and has a complex geography, roads are closed in most rural areas due to insecurity and snowfalls and people are unable take their patients to hospitals on time or they visit hospital when the patients are severely affected by diseases.”

Tamim said Faizabad Civil Hospital was unable to respond to all patients of the province.

This hospital should be turned to a zonal hospital with 200 to 400 beds and more personnel should be appointed so they would be able to respond to all patients, he said.

“Around 800 to 1,000 patients visit this hospital on daily basis and the personnel we have now cannot respond to them all,” he added.

Lalbigum who brought her nine month old child infected with pneumonia to Fiazabad Civil Hospital, said, “This child is ill since he was three months old and it is affected with pneumonia, I brough it to the hospital and its health condition is better now under doctors’ care.”

Wajiha is another mother whose five-month child is infected by pneumonia, said, “My child his hospitalized in the hospital since the last 10 days, it was once discharged after treatment but it was infected again by the disease last night, many children in our area are infected with this disease.”

Both the mothers asked for opening of clinics in their areas.

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