Dengue fever is ravaging cities and provinces nationwide, particularly in the southern region, however, many of them have yet to receive budgets for the epidemic control.
Funding shortage fails to control dengue fever
The disease has affected nearly 40,000 patients in 52 cities and provinces nationwide so far this year, up 35.3% year-on-year, including 26 deaths. Southern localities such as Khanh Hoa, Kien Giang, Binh Phuoc, Binh Thuan, Phu Yen and Soc Trang have seen a doubling the number of patients against the same period of last year.
The information was given by Dr. Tran Thanh Duong, Deputy Head of the Ministry of Health’s Department of Preventive Medicine at a recent conference dengue fever.
Among the fatalities, the southern region accounts for 80.7% of all deaths. Most of them were diagnosed late and moved to higher-level hospitals in critical condition after being treated at commune, district or private hospitals.
Doctor Le Bich Lien, Deputy Director of Children Hospital 1 in HCM City, said, “Most of the dengue fever patients are moved to the hospital when they’re already in a serious condition. Nevertheless, the supply of fluid, particularly macromolecule fluid has interrupted.”
Besides, many localities have not yet received their budget for dengue fever prevention and control this year. Tran Ngoc Huu, Head of Pasteur Institute in HCM City, said more patients had died of the disease and the risk of a wider outbreak was clear, but lots of localities were still waiting for funds to deal with the problem. As a result, the disease has attacked more victims.
Doctor Huynh Mong Hung, Deputy Director of the An Giang Province’s Preventive Medicine Centre, said in the first seven months of this year, the province saw 2,686 dengue fever cases, up 1.5 times against the same period of last year. Despite the locality’s efforts, late and modest funding from the Ministry of Health failed to control the epidemic. Until the disease spread the province had to use VND600 million (USD28,571) from the provincial budget moved from the 2011 spending plan.”
Most of provinces proposed the Ministry of Health to provide funding for them at the beginning of the year so that they could more rapidly deal with the disease.
Health Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien also admitted the late budget allocation for national dengue fever prevention programme, saying that, “We’ve held many meetings to seek opinions from the Ministry of Planning and Investment and the Ministry of Finance and other agencies on this issue. After meetings, appraisal and approval, the budget allocation was eventually approved in June by the National Assembly.”
The minister urged localities to actively spend their own funds on dengue fever prevention or advance fund for this activity.
