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Re: Cholera Outbreak in Papua New Guinea?s Morobe Province
Source: http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2009/s2769824.htm
Cholera spreads in PNG
Liam Fox reported this story on Saturday, December 12, 2009 08:09:00
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ELIZABETH JACKSON: Papua New Guinea's first cholera outbreak is continuing to worsen but a government promise to provide millions of dollars to fight the disease remains unfulfilled.
The Health Minister blames PNG's notoriously dysfunctional bureaucracy for the funding delay and the Minister says there's nothing more he can do.
An international aid agency also says it might not be able to help contain the disease for much longer.
Our PNG correspondent Liam Fox reports.
LIAM FOX: It's been four months since PNG's first cholera outbreak was declared in Morobe province on PNG's north coast.
Since then the disease has spread to neighbouring provinces and is now in East Sepik 500 kilometres to the west, where at least eight people have died and 280 others have been infected.
Aid agency Oxfam is working there to distribute hygiene kits and set up catchments of clean water.
Program coordinator Andrew Rankin says it's hard going.
ANDREW RANKIN: Many of these communities are very isolated including two to four hours travel by boat from Ungaran (phonetic) town.
So it's very difficult with supply chains for materials and for the logistics and communication. This is making the response slow.
LIAM FOX: He says more resources are needed to halt the rising number of infections.
ANDREW RANKIN: It does feel like in some ways we are working like fire fighters putting out spot fires as we go along instead of being able to really pull through with a very comprehensive response.
LIAM FOX: In September the Health Minister Sasa Zibe declared a public health emergency. It gave authorities the power to prevent people moving to and from infected areas and to close down unsanitary facilities such as fast food stores.
He also said the government would release around five-million dollars to provincial health authorities to deal with the outbreak. That is yet to happen.
Mr Zibe says lazy bureaucrats in the finance, planning and health departments are to blame.
SASA ZIBE: The thing that I am most disgusted and unhappy about is our bureaucracy. The people that are supposed to implement the government policies are not doing that.
LIAM FOX: While he may be disgusted the minister says he has done all he can.
SASA ZIBE: We have done what we can at a political level. So it is not my job to go and get the money and give it to those people out in the field.
LIAM FOX: The ABC made several unsuccessful attempts to contact the treasury, finance and planning departments to find out what's happened to the promised funds.
The health secretary Dr Clement Malau says he's expecting a cheque from the planning department for more than a million dollars to be cleared in the coming days.
CLEMENT MALAU: We will use it for the critical areas that we want to address. That means ongoing support to Lae and we're now seeing a severe epidemic in Lae.
Madang, (inaudible) and the East Sepik is a real complex situation. And I am also 100 per cent certain now that it might come to the nation's capital.
LIAM FOX: But Dr Malau says it will now take much more than $5 million dollars to contain cholera in PNG.
International agencies like the World Health Organisation and Medecins Sans Frontiers have played a vital role in the fight against cholera so far.
But back in East Sepik Andrew Rankin from Oxfam says their resources are stretched and they might not be able to help for much longer.
ANDREW RANKIN: I would say our initial response will continue at least until mid to late January, but after that we'll have to wait and see around? looking at our situation.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: That's Andrew Rankin from Oxfam ending that report from Liam Fox in Port Moresby.
Source: http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2009/s2769824.htm
Cholera spreads in PNG
Liam Fox reported this story on Saturday, December 12, 2009 08:09:00
Listen to MP3 of this story ( minutes)
Alternate WMA version | MP3 download
ELIZABETH JACKSON: Papua New Guinea's first cholera outbreak is continuing to worsen but a government promise to provide millions of dollars to fight the disease remains unfulfilled.
The Health Minister blames PNG's notoriously dysfunctional bureaucracy for the funding delay and the Minister says there's nothing more he can do.
An international aid agency also says it might not be able to help contain the disease for much longer.
Our PNG correspondent Liam Fox reports.
LIAM FOX: It's been four months since PNG's first cholera outbreak was declared in Morobe province on PNG's north coast.
Since then the disease has spread to neighbouring provinces and is now in East Sepik 500 kilometres to the west, where at least eight people have died and 280 others have been infected.
Aid agency Oxfam is working there to distribute hygiene kits and set up catchments of clean water.
Program coordinator Andrew Rankin says it's hard going.
ANDREW RANKIN: Many of these communities are very isolated including two to four hours travel by boat from Ungaran (phonetic) town.
So it's very difficult with supply chains for materials and for the logistics and communication. This is making the response slow.
LIAM FOX: He says more resources are needed to halt the rising number of infections.
ANDREW RANKIN: It does feel like in some ways we are working like fire fighters putting out spot fires as we go along instead of being able to really pull through with a very comprehensive response.
LIAM FOX: In September the Health Minister Sasa Zibe declared a public health emergency. It gave authorities the power to prevent people moving to and from infected areas and to close down unsanitary facilities such as fast food stores.
He also said the government would release around five-million dollars to provincial health authorities to deal with the outbreak. That is yet to happen.
Mr Zibe says lazy bureaucrats in the finance, planning and health departments are to blame.
SASA ZIBE: The thing that I am most disgusted and unhappy about is our bureaucracy. The people that are supposed to implement the government policies are not doing that.
LIAM FOX: While he may be disgusted the minister says he has done all he can.
SASA ZIBE: We have done what we can at a political level. So it is not my job to go and get the money and give it to those people out in the field.
LIAM FOX: The ABC made several unsuccessful attempts to contact the treasury, finance and planning departments to find out what's happened to the promised funds.
The health secretary Dr Clement Malau says he's expecting a cheque from the planning department for more than a million dollars to be cleared in the coming days.
CLEMENT MALAU: We will use it for the critical areas that we want to address. That means ongoing support to Lae and we're now seeing a severe epidemic in Lae.
Madang, (inaudible) and the East Sepik is a real complex situation. And I am also 100 per cent certain now that it might come to the nation's capital.
LIAM FOX: But Dr Malau says it will now take much more than $5 million dollars to contain cholera in PNG.
International agencies like the World Health Organisation and Medecins Sans Frontiers have played a vital role in the fight against cholera so far.
But back in East Sepik Andrew Rankin from Oxfam says their resources are stretched and they might not be able to help for much longer.
ANDREW RANKIN: I would say our initial response will continue at least until mid to late January, but after that we'll have to wait and see around? looking at our situation.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: That's Andrew Rankin from Oxfam ending that report from Liam Fox in Port Moresby.
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