KOHAT: The quality of medical services at the two government hospitals in Kohat is constantly declining due to the apathy of the provincial government.

Liaquat Memorial Hospital (LMH) was the first to be established in Kohat in 1953 keeping in view the medical needs of the local people. It spreads over 78 kanals and has 100 beds facility.

This hospital is now being run on day to day basis due to various reasons. Different sections of the LMH, also known as Women and Children’s Hospital, has now been given to other entities such as family planning office, Khidmat-i-Khalq organisation, Frontier Blood Transfusion Centre, school for deaf and dump, a nursing school etc, while its courtyard presents a scene of a rickshaw stand.

In year 2000 the Kohat divisional headquarters hospital was constructed in the KDA Town. Before that the government had closed down the women’s hospital at Sangerh and handed over its building to the FEF government degree college for girls.

The KDA hospital, which was established to provide all medical facilities to the people of Kohat, Hangu and areas as far as Kurram Agency, is still without vital facilities such as CT scan, MRI, burns ward and teaching facilities for the Kohat Institute of Medical Sciences.

Though officially the KDA hospital has 265 beds facility, hardly 100 beds are present there.

The emergency wards of both the hospitals are virtually run by philanthropists who provide money for X-ray films, equipment and medicines.

Former chief minister Haider Khan Hoti had announced during a visit of Kohat the award of category ‘A’ and a teaching hospital status to the KDA hospital. Similar promises were also made by former minister Syed Qalbe Hassan, Senator Abbas Afridi and MPA Amjid Khan, but all the announcements proved to be hollow slogans.

In 2002 then district nazim shifted surgical and medical wards of Liaquat Memorial Hospital to the KDA hospital where such facilities already existed.

The serious patients, including those injured in accidents and blasts, are usually referred from both the hospitals to Peshawar due to absence of trauma centre in Kohat.

Now there is an acute shortage of doctors in the KDA hospital because most of the doctors have joined the local medical college as teachers. Both the hospitals also have to deal with patients from Afghan refugee families and internally displaced people.

GAS SUPPLY: The government has sanctioned Rs6.6 billion for providing gas supply to the whole Kohat district and announced installation of electricity generation plant here.

This was stated by MNA Shehryar Afridi while addressing a public meeting in Mohammadzai village here on Sunday. He said that no village in Kohat would remain without gas facility because the PTI-led government believed in development of the country without any discrimination.

He said that Shydo was considering installing electricity generation plant of 25 megawatts at Spin Tang Pahari to provide relief to the people from loadshedding.