LAHORE, July 13: Punjab governor Khalid Maqbool has said the 'rat race' of purchasing expensive electro-medical equipment and medicines by the hospitals is a wrong trend owing to the economic situation of the country.
Speaking at the inaugural ceremony of a three-day national anti-polio vaccination campaign at the Children Hospital here on Tuesday, the governor said he did not want to comment how much doctors take share in purchasing the electro-medical equipment and medicines.
Being a poor country, he said Pakistan could not afford to conduct one after the other open heart surgeries, treatment of hepatitis and polio patients etc. He said the nation needed to fight the battle to gain health on the basis of preventive care rather than focusing on the curative side. He stressed the availability and usage of clean drinking water, adopting healthy dietary habits and developing clean environment.
The governor also urged the doctors to spend at least a minute on each of their patients, guiding them to adopt preventive measures to save themselves from different diseases. "I would like that health managers should fight the battle at the platform of prevention," he added.
The governor hoped that the teams constituted by the Punjab health department would ensure over 95 per cent coverage of anti-polio vaccination. Besides physical diseases, he said, the nation also needed to fight spiritual diseases like extremism, hatred and illiteracy.
Meanwhile, talking to reporters, the governor said elections were a part of the political process. He said it was the responsibility of the Election Commission to hold fair and transparent polls. He said the political process for the election of the prime minister would be completed in a proper manner.
Punjab health minister Dr Tahir Ali Javed said the Punjab was doing fairly well in controlling the polio cases. He said only three cases - two at Muzaffargarh and one at Faisalabad - had so far been reported since January this year.
Overall, he said, 19 cases had been reported from the country, including nine from Sindh, seven from the NWFP and three from the Punjab. He said no case had so far been reported from Balochistan.
In order to control the incidence of polio in the affected districts, he said the Unicef had hired communication officers for social mobilization to ensure that the affected areas could also be made polio-free in a campaign to make Pakistan the disease-free by the end of this year.
The minister said the health department had involved people from all walks of life to execute the campaign. He said the trends had changed and the world had recognized that no nation could strengthen its economy without improving its health indicators first. "We need a healthy population for the prosperity of Pakistan," he added.
Children Hospital and Institute of Child Health dean Prof Dr Sajid Maqbool said the hospital, besides offering curative services, was involved in preventive community outreach programme.
He said the hospital was actively involved in the eradication of polio. Later, the governor administered anti-polio drops to children present at the outdoor department of the hospital.
