15 January 2005	Saturday	04 Zilhaj 1425

PESHAWAR, Jan 14: Some experts have said that the province does not have the prerequisites of dealing with an eventuality be it an earthquake, an act of terrorism or any other disaster.

They called for putting a system in place that could tackle such a situation. "Given the record of the earthquakes that hit different parts of the Frontier province, it is all the more important to put in place a system that could deal with such an emergency," said an official in the health department who requested anonymity.

The province had been jolted by several earthquakes, some of which were highly devastating, during the last century, the official said, citing a report. "Since 1965, the province was hit by 12 major earthquakes that measured 6 on the Richter scale," he said.

The official said that some of the victims of those earthquakes could have been saved had the province had resources to meet the aftermath of such an eventuality. He specifically mentioned the havoc that the earthquake measuring 6.6 on the Richter scale had wreaked in Dir in 1983.

The infrastructure to deal with an emergency did not exist in a far off district like Dir alone, but a city like Peshawar, which had three teaching hospitals, was not equipped to deal with the catastrophe that a mass emergency could leave in its wake, the official said.

The three main hospitals in Peshawar -- Khyber Teaching Hospital, Lady Reading Hospital and Hayatabad Medical Complex (HMC) - have fewer than 100 beds in the emergency department, the official said.

Not only earthquakes, but even epidemics had caused hundreds of deaths in the past, he said. According to him, the outbreak of cholera in Sufaid Dheri village near Peshawar had rendered thousands of people in desperate need of emergency relief.

The official said that lives of many accident victims could have been saved had there been a proper infrastructure for emergency care. The threat posed by acts of terrorism, civil strife and fire incidents made it obligatory upon the health planners to draw a strategy to handle such eventualities, the official said.

Meanwhile, an Emergency Medical Officer of the World Health Organization (WHO), Dr Quaid, said that the situation concerning other prerequisites for dealing with an emergency -- ambulances, medicines, manpower -- was equally pathetic.