November 07, 2006	Tuesday	Shawwal 14, 1427

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JHANG, Nov 6: The medical superintendent of the DHQ Hospital has ordered an inquiry into the death of a pregnant woman in the gynaecology ward of the hospital. Lt-Commander Nawaz Jaffery (retired), a notable of Chandna village, told Dawn on Monday that Ghulam Abbas Qadi brought his wife Kulsoom to the DHQ hospital on Wednesday. She was admitted at about 4:30pm with labor pains. There was no lady doctor on duty at that time. The nurses on duty did not attend the patient. There was no blood available in the blood bank of the hospital and it had to be arranged from outside the hospital.

In the meantime the doctor, who belongs to an extremely influential family and reportedly very rarely visits the hospital, was repeatedly summoned to the hospital by the staff nurses on duty and the relatives of the patient but she did not bother to rush to the hospital. At about 9:15pm she died without delivering her child, apparently due to the apathy of the doctor and the nurses.

Ghulam Abbas filed a petition with the Jhang DCO seeking action against the doctor and the staff responsible for the death of his wife. The DCO directed the MS to take appropriate action who constituted an inquiry committee, headed by surgeon Dr Musarratul Hasnain to probe the matter and submit a report within seven days.

Meanwhile, human rights and Aurat Foundation activist Sajid Abdullah has strongly condemned the negligence of the lady doctor in dealing an emergency case and demanded exemplary punishment for the culprits.