LARKANA: Acute shortage of life-saving anti-rabies vaccine (ARV) has forced the poor patients to procure it from the open market, causing tremendous hardships to them in saving their precious lives.

As many as 4,808 dog bite cases were reported in the first six months of 2019 from January to June in four taluka of Larkana district for which only 6356 vials were supplied. The follow-up cases were 10,007 during the same period. These vaccines are provided to the ARV Centre by District Health Officer (DHO), Chandka Medical College Hospital (CMCH), PPHI and IHS which are to be injected to the affected cases of entire Larkana district as treatment of dog bite cases has been centralized since past several years owing to disputes between the health providers over jurisdiction of the cases.

According to the breakup, 2174 dog bite cases were reported in Larkana Taluka during the past six months, 1184 in Ratodero, 486 in Dokri and 984 in Bakrani taluka. These figures clearly indicate that Larkana & Ratodero are the most affected taluka in the district for which no effective campaign has been launched by the relevant local bodies institutions to eliminate stray & pye dogs in their respective limits despite repeated instructions by the Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner.

According to the data obtained on Friday, the total cost of the vaccines is Rs 54,83,200 (each vial cost is Rs 800) and cost of disposable syringes comes to Rs 1,30,400 (each syringe cost is Rs 10). In this way, the government spent Rs 56,13,600 on treatment of these cases and many were also left behind who either were not provided vaccines due to shortage or they purchased it from the market from their pocket. Those who could not afford to procure were left at the mercy of their Creator. The Centre also claims that 498 vials were also used which were procured from other unidentified sources. Last year in 2018 as many as 35,790 cases were reported at the Centre including follow up cases. These figures clearly indicate that killing of stray dogs must regularly be carried out quarterly to save precious human lives and taxpayers money. CMCH supplied 1236 vials to the Centre during the same period, PPH1 2600 vials and IHS 2520 vials only whereas DHO failed to give even a single vial for patients coming from his jurisdiction.