ALTHOUGH the World Health Organisation (WHO) has a guideline for Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) in the healthcare outlets especially dedicated to Covid-19 treatment only a handful of hospitals follow it, as per reports published in national dailies. Health experts opined that many lives could have been saved during the coronavirus pandemic if the IPC protocols were implemented at the medical facilities. It is crucial to maintain the protocol of infectious disease management for doctors, nurses, hospital management and others by any consideration. The necessity of infection prevention was propelled into the spotlight due to a growing number of doctors and health workers testing positive for coronavirus and dying from the disease.
According to Bangladesh Medical Association, 44 doctors died of Covid-19 until Saturday. Meanwhile, at least 3,437 health workers — 1,072 doctors, 938 nurses and 1,427 other hospitals staffers – got infected with Covid-19. We could have saved the lives of many doctors and reduced the rate of infection during this pandemic if we had properly maintained the IPC programme.
Experts said that many health workers were being infected with Covid-19 as they were not following the necessary protocols to avoid infection or failing to use Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) properly. Besides, cleaning hospitals is very important, but many cleaners, due to the lack or absence of proper training, cannot do it properly. Waste management at hospitals is another source from where the virus can be transmitted. We see in foreign countries that there is a dedicated unit at every hospital to supervise and monitor all these measures to prevent infection. However, in Bangladesh, no hospitals have designated manpower to prevent infection. As per the WHO guidelines, an IPC programme with a dedicated and trained team should be in place in each acute healthcare facility to prevent contagion.
After nearly five months we do not have urgency in improving the healthcare preparedness. The Chinese delegation came to Dhaka only to tell us how awful the hospital conditions were but offered no help for improving hospital facilities for treating corona patients. The government also accepted the criticism but we didn’t get help from China which has a huge financial involvement in Bangladesh.
