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| February 21, 2002 | Thursday | Zilhaj 8, 1422 |
Pakistan may lose overseas job opportunities
ISLAMABAD, Feb 20: Pakistan is likely to lose thousands of overseas employment opportunities for Pakistani medical staff such as consultants, paramedics and nurses in countries like the US due to poor handling of the health and labour ministries, an official source said.
He said various recruiting agencies in the US, Europe and Singapore, through Pakistani missions abroad, had expressed willingness of hiring qualified nurses/nursing assistants and other paramedical staff for their hospitals and specialist centres.
This was the first major demand from the US, as during the year 2001-2002, the OEC had received a demand of 500 consultants, 550 general doctors, 400 nurses and 220 paramedics. Similar, inquiries for employment of specialists, general doctors and nurses were also received from Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Malaysia and Libya which according to the source were under process.
The source said one of the employment firm M/s Deltec Total Solutions of the US had approached Pakistan’s embassy in Washington by placing a large demand of qualified nurses for hospitals in the US.
The source claimed that these firms were apparently keen to make arrangements for unlimited number of Pakistani qualified nurses for placement in different hospitals against lucrative terms of service.
Routed through the labour ministry, the demand was forwarded to the health ministry, which according to a source, had not yet responded to the opportunity. As a result, the labour ministry is still unaware of a possible decision of the health ministry for sending manpower abroad.
The labour ministry has suggested to the health ministry that it should play a ‘lead role’ and devise a comprehensive plan of action to assess the demand within the country and prepare for the upcoming employment opportunities in foreign countries.
The labour ministry has also communicated to the health ministry to allow the personnel, employed in government hospitals, to apply for the positions.
Meanwhile, when a senior official in the health ministry was approached, he commented that the information about the demand had already been disseminated to the four provinces