About 10 per cent of the country’s children suffer from different types of disabilities that might be caused by the mother’s malnutrition and pregnancy complications that are easily preventable, said health advisor AMM Shawkat Ali.
He was speaking at an inaugural ceremony of a national congress at the auditorium of Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons in Dhaka on Monday.
He said the government is committed to work on child disability that is a curse for not only a family but also for the state. The first two-day national congress of the Bangladesh Society for Child Neurology, Development and Disability began with the theme of ‘Improving quality of life of children with neurodevelopment disabilities’.
Several hundred children are born in the country with neurological problems that make them permanently disabled,’ said Shawkat.
National Professor and child specialist, MR Khan, said that at least 50 lakh children in the country are either mentally nor physically disabled, and three-fourth of them live in the rural area with poverty and deprivation of different basic needs.
At her welcome address, Naila Zaman Khan, the secretary general of BSCNDD said, ‘It is a concerted effort of a forum of child care professionals involved in the diagnosis, treatment, longer term management and rehabilitation of the children with neurodevelopmental impairments in the public sector.
She also stressed about the importance to establish Child Development Centres at major public hospitals in the country. This important field need to be institutionalised to ensure quality of survival of children, who are surviving the hazards of early malnutrition, maternal ill-health, poor antenatal care, stress, poverty and a range of infectious and brain results between conception and birth. Over 350 delegates from health institutions across the country and abroad attended the congress.
Professor Sultana Sarwatara Zaman was awarded with the ‘Agradoot’ award for her outstanding contribution in the field of child neurology, development and disability at the congress. At the congress, the BSCNDD also called for application for Hassina Alam Gold Medal for researchers on child neurology, development and disability.
This award will be announced and presented at the annual conference of BSCNDD. The BSCNDD was founded in 2006 with the aim of multi-professional development and establishment of Child Development and Neurology Units in major state-run hospitals especially at the divisional level and different districts.
Source: The Daily Commercial Times
Leave a Reply