TOBA TEK SINGH, Sept 26: Up to 27 basic health units (BHU) and 19 district council dispensaries have been functioning without doctors and paramedics for the last several years forcing people in remote areas to travel to tehsil or district headquarters hospitals for medical treatment, Dawn has learnt.

Officials say under the Punjab Rural Health Support Programme (RHSP), 66 BHUs and 23 district council dispensaries are controlled by RHSP’s management. Of the 66 BHUs, 27 have been without doctors while 31 posts of midwives, 42 of dispensers and 50 of other staff have yet to be filled.

Of the 23 district council dispensaries, only four have medical officers while other 19 dispensaries are short of doctors.

Most of dispensaries have no dispensers and sweepers get salaries without attending the office because of non-functioning of health facilities.

In BHUs, 17 medical officers are regular employees of the Health Department while 22 medical officers work under the RHSP.

Some doctors worked in more than one BHU on alternative days, an official said, adding the situation was creating problems for the patients.

RHSP District Manager Adil Shah told Dawn that although his organisation had authority to recruit doctors and paramedics on contract, the shortage of budget had stopped him from doing so. He said even medicines could not be bought for BHUs.

CASE: Gojra city police registered on Thursday cases on the complaint of SNGPL official Jaffar Husain against ice factory owner Muhammad Rashid and textile factory owner Liaqat Ali.

ABDUCTED: The young son of a farmer was abducted by unidentified people in Chak 427-JB in the Gojra area on Thursday.

According to Gojra Sadar police, Abdul Ghafoor’s son Shakoor was on his way to his farmhouse when some people bundled him into a car and fled.

DEMO: Scores of women and men from the All Pakistan Minorities’ Alliance and Awaz Forum staged a demonstration on Thursday at Shahbaz Sharif Chowk to condemn a suicide attack on Peshawar church.

They lit candles for the Christians who lost their lives in a suicide attack in Peshawar.

Former district nazim Chaudhry Muhammad Ashfaq, PPP leader Amer Jabbar, Awami Workers’ Party’s Mian Zubair and Simon Khursheed spoke.