Recent heavy seasonal rains have caused flooding and landslides in various parts of Myanmar. This has disrupted the operations and activities of health programmes delivering lifesaving healthcare services in many areas of the country.We have great concern for the affected communities and taken urgent measures to reduce impact of flooding on the Global Fund supported AIDS, TB and malaria activities in the worst affected areas of the country mainly Ayeyarwaddy, Bago, Chin, Magwe, Rakhine andSagaing Regions.
With the Ministry of Health leading the nationwide emergency response, our planned activities include assessing the flood impact on the townships where our partners are working, while also supporting the evacuation and local community response.
The Disease Control Programme and UNOPS-PR have requested quick reprogamming of the Global Fund’s financed plan to respond to the flood emergency. The Global Fund Secretariats have approved these changes in plans to allow for distribution of over one million long lasting insecticidal nets to the affected areas through the National Malaria Control Programme and its partners.
In response to the urgent needs, additional quick plans were approved to allow for transportation of drugs and health commodities including artemisinin-based combination therapy, malaria rapid diagnostic test kits, antituberculosis drugs,antiretroviral drugs, Information, Education and Communication (IEC) materials, to replace damaged items and transport them following medical protocol.
The National AIDS Programme and Pyi Gyi Khin have already extended support for people living with HIV/AIDS who were affected by the flood. The emergency support includes provision of antiretroviral drugs, essential medicines and health supplies for the opportunistic infections from AIDS and nutritional support for people living with HIV/AIDS and their families. Plans are underway to deploy mobile clinic to reach HIV/AIDS patients who are out of reach of fixed clinic.
The National TB Programme supported by local and international non-governmental organizations and United Nations agencies, has already made plans for the maintenance and repair of health equipment mainly those operate with electricity like X-ray and Gene Xpert machines that could be damaged due to the disruption of power supply from flooding.
Additional plans have been approved to reach patients on treatment who are lost to follow-up from flooding through defaulter tracing and the mobile active case finding teams to relief and resettled camps.
