THE IRRAWADDY (Chiang Mai, Thailand) 25 August 08 Snakebite Death Highlights Medicine Shortages (Min Lwin and Violet Cho)
The death of a young Rangoon student after being bitten by viper has highlighted the serious shortage of antidote preparations in Burmese hospitals, according to sources within the country’s medical profession.
The snakebite victim, Myat Su Mon, a second year student at Rangoon’s Technological University, died after three hospitals were reportedly unable to treat her with lifesaving antidote.
“Almost every hospital in the city is short of antidote for bites from venomous snakes like vipers and cobras,” said a Rangoon physician.
“Usually, antidote is stocked in areas with a significant snakebite risk,” said a doctor at Rangoon’s Medical Department.
The Ministry of Health launched an inquiry into the death of Myat Su Mon, and the superintendant and duty doctor at one of the hospitals, Insein, were fired, according to a doctor there.
Insein Hospital transferred Myat Su Mon to Rangoon General. “We had antidote at the hospital that day,” the Insein doctor said. “I don’t know why she was transferred to Rangoon General.”
Snakebite antidote is produced by Burma’s Myanmar Paramedical Factory, which issues more than 40,000 bottles annually.
Burma’s Minister of Health, Dr Kyaw Myint, has denied there is a shortage of antidote, saying sufficient supplies were reaching hospitals, particularly those in Rangoon and Irrawaddy Division. Local health authorities were instructed to administer antidote supplies efficiently, he said.
Some in the medical profession, however, point to Burma’s abysmal performance in health care and suggest snakebite treatment is one of the areas that are not covered adequately.
Between 30 and 50 percent of Burma’s budget goes towards military expenditure and only 3 percent on health care.
Burma also has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in Southeast Asia, and infant mortality (under 1 year old) and child mortality (under 5 years old) are at least four times higher than in Thailand.
A report by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in 2006 said that the junta’s failure to offer its citizens adequate healthcare means more resistant strains of malaria and tuberculosis are developing in Burma.
Similarly, the report concludes that Burma is a melting pot for increasingly diverse strains of the HIV virus, and that the country is at risk of failing to adequately monitor and contain bird flu, with potentially deadly results both nationally and outside the country.
Snakebite Death Highlights Medicine Shortages