The State health department has decided to strengthen the departmental infrastructure and financial management to tackle the vector borne diseases like Dengue and Malaria and diseases like Swine Flu, Zika and Japanese encephalitis. A decision into this effect was taken in a meeting of the departmental officials in the health directorate on Monday.  In the meeting discussion on setting up an effective mechanism to deal with the menace of the vector borne diseases and Swine flu were held.

Presiding over the meeting, the director general (DG) health services Dr Ravindra Thapliyal directed the officials to ensure that the necessary medicines are available in all the government hospitals for these diseases. He also emphasised on the importance of making the people aware about adopting measures to combat these diseases. Dr Thapliyal said that it is generally seen that the paucity of budget adversely affects the campaign against the diseases like dengue, malaria, H1 N1, Zika and Japanese encephalitis. He directed the officials to prepare budget for these activities so that a demand is made on the state administration for sufficient and timely release of the budget.

In the meeting brainstorming on the measures to be adopted for strengthening Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) and vector borne diseases programme was done. The DH assured that the department would make a proposal to the state administration in which demand for sufficient budget for these measures would be made.

Addressing the meeting the state nodal officer IDSP, Dr Pankaj Kumar Singh said that the districts located in the plain areas of the state especially Udham Singh Nagar and Haridwar and very sensitive for diseases like dengue and malaria. He stressed a need for adopting a strategy in which the health officials of these sensitive districts are in constant communication with their counterparts in the districts of Uttar Pradesh whose boundaries are touching the state.  Dr Singh said that the Asha workers and other employees of the department are needed to be trained for effectively combating vector borne diseases and for it they should be provided regular orientation.

The meeting was attended by director health, Dr Amita Upreti, director National Health Mission (NHM) Dr Anjali Nautiyal, director finance S S Singh, additional director National programme Dr Saroj Naithani and others.