The Ministry of Health Zanzibar has said that it will make deliberate efforts to see that communication is done with Health laboratories and other laboratories in the country with the aim of dealing with various diseases, including outbreaks.
Speaking in a meeting to review the Laboratory Guidelines for various stakeholders, the Medical Director of the Ministry of Health Zanzibar Dr. Marijan Msafiri said that the confirmation of many diseases is done in the laboratory and then the whole exercise to deal with the relevant diseases will be done.
He has said that it is good to have close cooperation between health laboratories and other laboratories including animal ones due to the fact that some diseases come from animals to humans, misuse of antibiotics which causes resistance to the pathogens of these diseases.
He has informed that in response to the use of antibiotics, the Ministry of Health collaborates closely with other stakeholders in controlling the use of these drugs by implementing antimicrobial resistance strategies and they continue to monitor the trend of diseases when they emerge.
He has asked the stakeholders to review the Guidelines and set strategies that every Laboratory specialist will ensure that he does his work in accordance with the policy of the guideline immediately after its completion.
Dr. Marijani has said that in order to deal with various diseases, the Ministry of Health will continue to cooperate with other Ministries so that when diseases arise, they can work together and be able to eliminate them immediately.
On the part of the Health Specialist from CDC Tanzania, Saida Murugwa has said that there are no outbreak diseases in one institution, it is better to work together, it helps to eliminate them immediately when the disease enters the country and the existence of a laboratory policy will help the situation becourse it has covered all the important parts.
And the representative from ICAP, Dr. Haji Hussein, said that their Institute has been working closely with the Government through the Ministry of Health to ensure that Health priorities are fulfilled more effectively, especially in the laboratory.
He said that the meeting of the experts is one of the ways to help provide their expertise to strengthen the guidelines for laboratory experts which will help the laboratories to be able to properly report diseases on time and ensure that they are provided with early solutions.
The head of investigative services at the Ministry of Health Zanzibar, Abdallah Said Mohamed, said that after the completion of the guide, there will be a first draft that will be discussed in detail with other stakeholders to be able to find ideas that will make the guide better.
This meeting has been organized by the Ministry of Health in collaboration with ICAP and CDC Tanzania.
