Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

‘No denial of treatment to TB patients’

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Health Minister P.K. Sreemathy has said that the State government has not denied treatment to TB patients as reported in the media and alleged by Leader of the Opposition Oommen Chandy.

The Health Minister told a news conference here on Thursday that the government was giving second line treatment to the 168 Multi-Drug Resistant (MDR) patients identified in the State and had allocated Rs.50 lakh for the purpose. In fact, the government had done this against the advice of the Central government; that the States should not procure and supply medicines to MDR patients on account of the possibility of their developing resistance to second line treatment and ending up with the even more dangerous condition of Extreme Drug Resistance (XDR). The State government had received a warning from the Centre on this as late as April 8, she pointed out.

Ms. Sreemathy, accompanied by Special Secretary (Health) Usha Titus, Director of Health Services K. Shylaja and Director of Medical Education P.V. Ramachandran, pointed out that second line treatment could be given only after a person was diagnosed to be multi-drug resistant through laboratory tests. There were only three laboratories in the country accredited to carry out these tests and the nearest of them was in Chennai.

What the State did was to collect the sputum of the patients who developed multi-drug resistance and send it to the Chennai laboratory and continue with the Category Two treatment meant for first line patients till the results were received. This normally took three to four months, but there was no danger on account of that, she said.

The present government had taken steps to renovate the dedicated hospital for chest diseases as Pulayanarkotta, which used to be known as TB Sanatorium, and to set up a laboratory capable of carrying out tests for MDR tuberculosis.

The State government would continue providing medicines to the MDR tuberculosis patients regardless of the Central directive as it was committed to doing so, Ms. Sreemathy said.

The Special Secretary (Health) said the laboratory should get Central accreditation in three months and steps were being taken to ensure round-the-clock supply of water and power to the laboratory.

All that the government had done was clarify that treatment for MDR tuberculosis would be available only to those who were diagnosed with the condition through tests at one of the accredited laboratories, she added.

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