KP to launch first-ever hepatitis hospital next month

PESHAWAR – The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government is launching the province’s first-ever hepatitis hospital because of the increasing number of patients.

“The hospital will start operations in a three-storey building next month where about 54,000 patients would be given free diagnostic and treatment facilities every year,” Dr. Abdul Subkhan of the KP health department told Central Asia Online July 3.

Presently, the KP government spends Rs. 500m (US $5.3m) annually on three hepatitis programmes. The government will merge them and treat all registered hepatitis patients at the new hospital, he said.

“We have also planned to establish a liver transplant unit at the hospital and make the facility a specialised one,” he said.

KP has registered 26,000 hepatitis B and 29,000 hepatitis C patients, he said.