Bihar to deploy trained doctors and nurses to tackle AES this year

A massive awareness program about the disease in the worst affected areas will also be launched.

Bihar health department will deploy 30 trained doctors along with 40 nurses to help minimize the casualties among children due to acute encephalitis syndrome (AES) this year in the worst-affected districts.

A relative sits next to a child patient who is suffering from acute encephalitis syndrome at a hospital in Muzaffarpur, Bihar, June 20, 2019. REUTERS/Alasdair Pal (REUTERS)

Names of these doctors and paramedic staff have been sent to the civil surgeons in the worst-hit districts of north Bihar with the instruction to depute them to hospitals, where kids are likely to be taken for treatment.

Chief medical officer-cum-civil surgeon of Muzaffarpur (in-charge) Dr Harendra Alok, said these doctors and nursing staff were trained at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences at New Delhi and Patna.

“These doctors and nurses will take care of the ailing children apart from documenting every detail of the illness: What short of medicines will be given, what are the symptoms and the effect of the drugs,” he said.

Meanwhile, the divisional commissioner of Tirhut, Manish Kumar, held a review meeting with all the six district magistrates from Muzaffarpur, Sitamarhi, Vaishali and Sheohar along with East and West Champarans to assess the preparedness for tackling the deadly disease, which has taken more than 5000 lives of innocent kids aged between 6 months to 15 years in the last two and a half decades.

Kumar asked all the DMs to launch a massive awareness program about the disease in the worst affected areas. “Since, we have no proper medication for treating the ailing kids, as reasons behind its spread is yet to be discovered, so we must follow the ‘prevention is better than cure’ theory to minimize the deaths of children. And spreading awareness about it is one of the important tools in this regard,” he said.

The commissioner added that an integrated command center, related to the AES, is to be set up at the Sadar hospital for day to day monitoring of the situation. “This center will start functioning from March 1 this year. Anybody can call this center and give information about the disease,” he said.

The DM of Muzaffarpur, Pranav Kumar informed that awareness programmes started on February 3 this year.

Muzaffarpur is one of the worst-affected districts by the AES. More than 1,000 kids have fallen prey to this disease in the last one decade.