KARACHI: Shifting of samples from services hospital risky
By Hasan Mansoor
KARACHI, Dec 10: As the Sindh health minister has ordered dismantling of the Services Hospital, what bothers officials of the Chemical Examiner’s (CE) office situated on the same premises along M.A. Jinnah Road is shifting of thousands of samples which they think will lead to all sorts of serious risks.
Insiders in the CE office said the samples on which thousands of criminal cases based could fritter away or be changed during the shifting that could change the very nature of those cases.
The CE office caters to Sindh and Balochistan, where it is referred to various samples from the courts of the two provinces and their findings decide the very direction of those cases.
Insiders said this office had been functioning alongside the Services Hospital for many decades and it had a precious record of thousands of decided, pending and current cases.
“Such a shifting could destroy these samples or some unscrupulous elements could change them, which could decide the cases against the innocents and render the culprits free,” said a health department official.
Besides, officials at the CE’s office are also worried about their own safety. They said the existing location was in the centre of the city with crowded surroundings, which ensured them ample security.
“These officials use to be under tremendous pressure from the criminals given the fact that their opinion usually decides the cases,” said a health departmental official who has received anxious reaction from the CE’s office.
He referred to the concerns in those officials and said the CE’s employees – over 80 in numbers – wanted to remain at the central location to safeguard themselves and all the samples.
The CE has three major sections. The Narcotic section has two wings: one caters to the samples of heroin and opium while the other deals with hashish and bhang. The second section examines the samples from viscera etc to detect poison-related cases while the third checks blood samples on props like cloths, weapons, earth etc.Investigations show the CE office has received over 500 samples of heroin and opium, around 1,700 samples of hashish and bhang, some 564 samples of poison and 603 blood samples since January to November 30. Besides, the premises reserves tens of thousands of samples it has received over the past decades.
Provincial health minister Syed Sardar Ahmed has lately ordered the Services Hospital, CE office, Police Surgeon, the Sindh Blood Transfusion Authority, HIV/AIDS Centre and Central Drug Testing Authority – all located on one premises – to start packing as the government had decided to pump 1.5 billion rupees received from Islamabad into a project to construct a state-of-the-art trauma centre on that location.
Interestingly, asking these establishments to start packing before December 15 the health ministry has not yet notified any locations for them to be moved. Similar is the case with the 40-plus families who have quarters in the premises and been asked to change location.
The health officials referred to the recently-introduced health insurance scheme for the secretariat employees and claimed that that had made the Services Hospital useless. Investigations show that so far not more than 2,100 employees of the Sindh Secretariat had been covered with that scheme and that too was much limited.“The insurance scheme only pays 15,000 rupees to the employee who undergoes C-section and the rest of 10,000 rupees are to be paid by the employee himself/herself,” said an official.
He said if the Services Hospital Karachi is razed then there would be merely one Services Hospital in Hyderabad, which offered merely OPD facility.
Recently, the health department has gathered a report that suggested that the Services Hospital is crowded with commercial and non-commercial buildings and situated on the one-way of M.A. Jinnah Road that means a slightest disturbance, traffic congestion, law and order situation (invariable under emergency situation) will block not only the entry to hospital, the whole M.A. Jinnah Road as well and will cease every casualty measure.
It also points at the security risks to the offices within Services Hospital premises, for example the Civil Surgeon Office (with very sensitive records) in case of public hostility under emergency.
The government has been suggested to procure the site of Sea Breeze Hospital, which had easy traffic approach. The multistory building is already constructed for a large hospital.
Other alternatives suggested include the Roti Plant area in front of the Civic Centre, which is an open space and situated at the virtual centre of the city.
