November 20, 2005	Sunday	Shawwal 17, 1426

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PESHAWAR, Nov 19: The Pakistan Medical Association has called for restructuring of the destroyed infrastructure in quake-hit areas to provide medical relief to people on consistent basis. “For this purpose, the government must allocate certain amount from the president relief fund to hire doctors, paramedics and nurses”, said, Dr Umar Ayub Khan, president Pakistan Medical Association at a news conference here on Saturday.

Accompanied by association secretary-general Dr Shershah Syed, President PMA’s Punjab chapter Dr Mohammad Ali and others, he said that the PMA had prepared a plan for restructuring of the health infrastructure in the quake-ravaged areas of the country.

“According to the plan, the government should immediately appoint 300 doctors along with 1,000 paramedics and nurses to cater to the medical needs of the quake survivors on permanent basis.

He said that there was no dearth of doctors as some 60,000, out of 1,40,000 registered doctors in the country were jobless, whose services can be hired through offering them lucrative salaries.

Dr Syed, a top Karachi-based gynaecologist, said he along with other doctors and relief workers had been to all the quake-hit areas. He said that the health infrastructure was in a shambles. The earthquake has badly affected the problem of maternal health, because apart from the destruction of the health facilities, most of the traditional birth attendants had either died or migrated to safer places.

He said that they with the assistance of medical association of other countries had established two labour rooms one each at Mansehra and Muzaffarabad, but these were not enough to cater to the needs of the patients.

“In every population three per cent of the women remain pregnant, who need services of doctors and nurses to give them pre and post-natal care”, Dr Syed said.

He said that the relief work should be divided into three parts, i.e., reconstruction, and provision of basic needs and medical relief. This, he said should be done by the government itself.

Expressing concern over the lukewarm response by the government, he said that it was a matter of grave concern that bodies are still lying there and urged the government to make immediate arrangements for the burial of the dead.

He said it was high time that the government put in place two facilities, where CT, MRI scanners along with well-equipped ICU be made available.

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