Heavy snowfall disrupts delivery of health services

BAMYAN (SW) – Heavy snowfall has disrupted delivery of health services in a number of provinces in the central parts of the country.

Health officials at the Aga Khan Development Foundation and the Welfare and Mobility Institute, which are responsible for providing health services in Bamyan and Daikundi provinces, say that due to heavy snowfall and severe storms, at least five districts of Daikundi and two districts of Bamyan have been closed and the provision of health services in these districts has been disrupted.

Hassan Mustamandiar, a health official with the Aga Khan Development Foundation, said that there were 31 health centers in Punjab and Vers Bamyan districts, including two hospitals, of which 29 had been closed and patients had not been able to seek treatment. According to him, the roads of a number of health centers in Yakawlang and Shabar districts of Bamyan have been closed due to heavy snowfall and storms.

“The closure of transportation routes to health centers limits people’s access to health services and, in many cases, causes urgent patients and women who have difficulty giving birth to not reach the health center and perish.”

Meanwhile, Mohammad Hussain Muzaffari, head of the welfare institute’s health project in Daikundi, said heavy snowfall and severe storms in the past two days had affected the provision of health services in the cold districts of the province.

“The provision of health services in parts of Nili, a large part of Miramur district and Sang-e-Takht-e-Bandar, Khadir, Ashtarli and Daikundi districts has been facing difficulties due to heavy snowfall and severe storms for the past two days,” he said.

According to the officials of these institutions, it is very likely that more than 50% of the residents of the mentioned districts have been deprived of health services as a result of the closure of the transportation routes of the health centers due to snow and storms.

However, Maulvi Salman, the head of public health at the Islamic Emirate in Bamyan, said he was unaware of the closure of health centers.

On the other hand, officials of the Bamyan and Daikundi Public Works Departments say that most of the transportation routes between the two provinces have been reopened to traffic and efforts to reopen other roads will continue.

ENDS

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