NEW DELHI: The World Health Organization (WHO) on Thursday urged member countries in the South-East Asian region to maintain essential health services and accelerate the resumption of disrupted health care services hit by the coronavirus pandemic, as an integral part of the COVID-19 response.
A rapid assessment of 25 essential services carried out by WHO in May showed significant disruptions to essential health services across the world, including the Maintain essential health services during COVID-19, says WHO South-East Asia Region. Routine immunisation and supplementary measles and rubella campaigns were disrupted in eight of the region's 11 countries.
According to the apex organisation, both out-patient and in-patient services for non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, cancer and others have been greatly affected. The most affected service has been mental health, which is critical in these difficult times.
"Across the region, family planning, antenatal care and institutional childbirth services have been reduced significantly, impacting our capacity to accelerate reductions in maternal and neonatal mortality," said Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director WHO South-East Asia Region said.
Health system pressures, reduced service utilisation, damaged supply chains and the potential for reductions in health spending could inhibit progress towards universal health coverage and weaken the battle against antimicrobial resistance (AMR). If case detection for TB drops by 50 per cent over a period of three months, the region could return to 2012 levels.
"The pandemic has put immense strain on health systems across the South-East Asia Region. We must fast track efforts and do all we can to avoid that happening while continuing efforts to break COVID-19 transmission chains," said Dr Singh, in a virtual meeting with health ministers from the region. She said that previous disease outbreaks have shown that disruption to essential services caused by an outbreak can be more deadly than the outbreak itself. (IANS)