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Gilgit

Offices of Mashabrum Tours Bus Service to be sealed following Babusar Accident

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Mashabrum Tours Bus Service Accident

Gilgit-Baltistan Police, Excise Office, and District Administration of Skardu have decided to seal all office of Mashabrum Tours Bus Service following the tragic bus accident near Babusar Pass. Meanwhile, Deputy Commissioner Skardu Khurram Mansoor has suspended the license of Mashabrum Bus Service.

Mashabrum Tours Bus Service

26 people had lost their lives and 15 others were left injured when a Mashabrum bus went out of control on Naran-Babusar Road at hit a cliff while taking a turn.

Netizens and activists have been protesting about the lack of proper inspection of the buses, many of which belong to the Government’s own operated Northern Areas Transport Corporation (NATCO).

According to another unconfirmed report, Mashabrum Bus Service did not have a permit to operate on the Naran-Babusar Road, which is considered tricky as the vehicles have to cross Babusar Pass at about 4,173 meters.

According to a reliable source, the main office of Mashabrum Tours in Skardu and Gilgit districts have already been closed while the authorities have ordered to seal offices operated by the private bus service.

GBee Staff keeps you updated with the latest happenings in Gilgit, Baltistan and Chitral regions of Pakistan.

Gilgit

Innovative Strategies to Decrease burden on Doctors and Nurses During COVID-19 Outbreak

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Sultan Karim - Gilgit-Baltistan Blogger on GBee

During 2000-2003, Thailand introduced the task-shifting model among its different cadre of health care professionals to decrease the burden on doctors in maternal and child health sectors. This was done to decrease load on the doctors and especially gynecologists who cannot reach far-flung areas during labour and delivery phases. They trained the nurses for the process of assessment of a pregnant woman and also see for any danger sign. These measures overall improved the indicators of maternal and neonatal deaths in Thailand.

There was another article published in 2015 in the Journal of Gynecology and Obstetrics suggesting task shifting is helpful in saving a precious life. In recent COVID 19 pandemic, all the health care force is forefront and we have also lost a couple of frontline warriors including a doctor and X-ray technician. Moreover, the remaining doctors are also less in number to see and asses each and every patient carefully.

During the outbreak of Coronavirus in Gilgit-Baltistan, doctors and nurses will eventually get exhausted due to a high burden of coronavirus patients. To prevent this Gilgit-Baltistan Government can make a proactive plan to make a force ready to replace during an unforeseen event. There are strategies that can easily be implemented, COVID-19 patient has some specific symptoms and based on those the patient is sent to quarantine while sending his laboratory test sample right there and then.

We need to train our nurses, 1122 staff, Lady Health Workers (LHWs), Community Health Workers (CHWs) and other volunteers like Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) people regarding the early signs of COVID 19 and for collecting the sample from patients, nasal swab or swab from the larynx. This will create enough human resources at the back end and relieve doctors for looking toward many critical patients and also they get time to have enough sleep.

At a quarantine center, a nurse can observe the patient’s condition and report to higher authorities and if any patients deteriorate immediately move to the next health facility where a doctor will manage, maybe that is a Civil Hospital or DHQ Hospital. Moreover, the staff can be monitored for their performance.

Dr. Usama Riaz Coronavirus DHQ Hospital Gilgit-Baltistan
A doctor at DHdQ Hospital Gilgit monitoring a critical coronavirus patient.

The proper triage, quarantine, and isolation would be helpful in decreasing the load of COVID-19 spread. Triaging is a technique where most needy is given priority based on the condition of the patient however Italy, the United States and all other countries where mortality is high, have decided to go with patients treatment whose prognosis is good.

Nevertheless, we don’t need to do that we have facilities available and can be triaged based on condition.

There should be separate quarantine facility or isolation for positive cases and suspected cases because those who are suspected can be negative and catch the coronavirus from a neighbor who is positive. The negative person is released and in the community he can spread the disease so monitoring of positive patients as well as negative patients is necessary.

People are pushing the need for ventilators and high technical support staff, the need for the hour is smart management and no ventilator. Making multiple cadres of the health workforce to divide the load on doctors and nurses.

Testing more people and quarantining patients. A quarantine center is supplied with enough oxygen as a patient might need so he can be provided. All the patients who need oxygen don’t need a ventilator this is a myth.

Oxygen can be supplied to a patient with a nasal prong & face mask. If there is a further difficulty, it can be handled through Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) and Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure (BIPAP). Both CPAP and BIPAP are machines that can easily be operated by Nurses and Lady Health Workers.

A ventilator is the last resort to save a people who cannot breathe on their own and the patient needs to be intubated.  This needs an expert Intensivist, an Anesthesia Specialist to operate or an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) trained nurses. Sadly, we have very little of them in Pakistan. I can tell from my experience that smart work can also decrease load and also effective in such an emergency situation.

In conclusion, Chief Minister Gilgit Baltistan Hafiz Hafeez Ur Rehman should initiate this and people will volunteer who can be trained in the next one week. This team is necessary to face the COVID 19. CM Gilgit-Baltistan should bring in their resources to equip the team with necessary Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) and see the change in the graph.

These measures will surely enable the Government of Gilgit-Baltistan to quarantine up to ten times more people compared to the Gilgit-Baltistan Government’s current capacity.

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Chitral

7 Photo-stories on World Water Day 2020 from Gilgit-Baltistan and Chitral (GBC)

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AKAH Pakistan World Water Day 2020 Stories
AKAH Pakistan

World Water Day is celebrated every year on 22nd March as an observance day to highlight the importance of freshwater. The day is used to advocate for the sustainable management of freshwater resources.

As part of the World Water Day 2020 celebrations, Aga Khan Agency for Habitat (AKAH) shares these stories of people from Gilgit-Baltistan and Chitral whose lives have been deeply impacted by water and sanitation-related projects in the region.

AKAH Pakistan World Water Day 2020 Stories
Over half of the people across Pakistan lack access to safe and clean water and have no choice but to consume water from whatever source exists in their villages, regardless of quality. Aga Khan Agency for Habitat, aiming to improve quality of life, is implementing water supply schemes across mountain communities in Pakistan.
AKAH Pakistan World Water Day 2020 Stories
In mountainous parts of Gilgit-Baltistan and Chitral, traditional wells are used as water reservoirs collecting the water coming from streams through canals. This water, coming directly from open sources, is unsafe as it is contaminated due to its exposure to both humans and animals. Without access to another source of water, people use this unsafe water for different purposes including drinking, cooking, and other domestic purposes.
AKAH Pakistan World Water Day 2020 Stories
Clean drinking water has always been a huge problem for communities living in mountainous areas of Gilgit-Baltistan and Chitral. Women and children are impacted the most as they must travel long distances to fetch water for cooking, washing, and laundry. AKAH’s work to connect each household to safe and clean with a water tap in their home enables women to keep their children safe from waterborne diseases, spend more quality time with their families, and also reduces time and labor lost to fetching water.
AKAH Pakistan World Water Day 2020 Stories
Aga Khan Agency for Habitat (AKAH), with the help of communities, identifies water sources in the village, tests the water quality using its technical expertise, develops water infrastructure, constructs water reservoirs, and provides each family with a water tap in their home. More than 500,000 people across Pakistan now have access to safe drinking water in their homes, through AKAH’s efforts.
AKAH Pakistan World Water Day 2020 Stories
Aga Khan Agency for Habitat’s WASEP model uses a community-based approach to help mountain communities get year-round all-season access to safe water. AKAH’s approach uses deep digging and other techniques to ensure that water does not freeze in the pipes despite the fact that these villages are covered in snow for more than five months of the year.
AKAH Pakistan World Water Day 2020 Stories
“I enjoy taking freshwater from this tap in my home; you would say I am in love with it that’s why I stand here many times a day”.
AKAH Pakistan World Water Day 2020 Stories
Aga Khan Agency for Habitat, with its mandate to improve quality of life, is helping women and young girls across Pakistan enjoy a healthy life, by providing access to safe water in their homes, reducing their exposure to water-borne diseases, allowing them to spend more quality time with families.
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