Safe injections Protecting Millions From Hepatitis C, B and AIDS

Safe injection initiative gets right to the point
Written By: Ash on November 10, 2010 0
The UAE initiative for patient safety through safe use of injections was announced yesterday at the 11th Annual Conference of Safety Injection Global Network (Sign).

The initiative, the first of its kind in the world, aims to protect millions of people from communicable diseases such as Hepatitis B and C and Aids through providing free safe injections for these people.

The conference was opened yesterday by Dr Hanif Hassan, Minister of Health, who announced the initiative.

“The United Arab Emirates always strives to raise the standards of health care services in the UAE and emphasise that successful health care is an integral part of human development and progress in the society,” Dr Hassan said.

“The safety of injections is one of the most important initiatives in the field of health care all over the world,” he said.

Statistics show that one person dies every 24 seconds in the world due to unsafe injections. Hence, about 1.3 million death cases happen each year and this can be avoided through effective educational and awareness programmes from one side and safe equipment and tools from the other side.

“In this context, I would like to salute the global medicine companies-who are supported by the Ministry of Health-for their efforts in providing 8 million safe injections to the needed countries without any discrimination of distinction in order to create an advanced injection industry in the UAE and provide much of the world’s needs in this field,” Dr Hassan said.

Dr Ameen Al Amiri, CEO of Medical Practice and Licence and Chairman of the Supreme National Blood Transfusion Committee, said around 40 per cent of injections are not given properly and not sterilised, especially in developing countries, while safe injections are sold in black markets sometimes.

“Over 16 billion injections are given every year, out of which 90 per cent are for treatment, 5 per cent are vaccines and the rest are for various medical reasons such as blood transfusion or contraception,” he said.

“Unsafe injections cause the loss of over 26 million human life years ever year, and statistics show that they cause 21.7 million cases of Hepatits B every year, which amount to 33 per cent of total new infections,” Dr Al Amiri said.

“They also cause 2 million cases of Hepatitis C, about 42 per cent of new infections, as well as 2 per cent of new Aids infections, and this figure is expected to rise to 9 per cent in the next few years,” he said.

The campaign aims to provide 8 million safe injections to be distributed to needy countries, and the ministry hopes this initiative will include other donating countries as well. It also supports national industries since all donated syringes were manufactured in the UAE, Dr Al Amiri said.

Dina Aboul Hosn
Gulf News
http://biomedme.com/general/safe-injection-initiative-gets-right-to-the-point_20362.html