PESHAWAR: Chief Minister Pervez Khattak has said that the provincial government is introducing a new health reform policy under which all the hospitals and health centres would be made autonomous and empowered in all respects with the only condition that they would ensure provision of treatment and health care facilities to the patients round the clock.

He said the modern treatment facilities being provided at the Lady Reading Hospital(LRH), Peshawar, would be made available at all the divisional and district hospitals so that the patients of far-flung areas did not need to travel to Peshawar, while the medical and administration departments would be separated in the hospitals.

He alleged that wrong policies of the past corrupt regimes rendered all the institutions unable to deliver to masses that were otherwise running with the hard earned money of the people.

The chief minister was addressing the inaugural ceremony of the second phase of free treatment programme of poor cancer patients here on Thursday.

Second phase of programme for free treatment of cancer patients launched

The provincial government is running the programme in collaboration with a pharma company Novartis.

The ceremony was also addressed by provincial health secretary Mushtaq Jadoon, Novartis chief executive Shahab Rizvi, head of oncology department Prof Abid Jameel and Hayatabad Medical Complex chief executive Mumtaz Marwat who highlighted various aspects of the programe.

Under the programme, the provincial government would provide Rs600 million this year while a major chunk of 94 per cent of expenditures on treatment of patients would be borne by the company.

Mr Khattak said that the provincial government would expand the health welfare programmes for poor patients in various sectors, including cancer.

He said that health insurance policy was being introduced for free treatment of people. He said that drastic changes were being made to improve treatment facilities in the province.

He said that they would formulate policies for the people who had attached great expectations with this government. He showed great concern that people in the prime of their lives were affected by blood cancer.

He said that 250 new patients were diagnosed each year in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa alone, which was alarming. He said that even more worrying was the fact that the treatment for this cancer was very expensive and out of reach of most of the patients.

He said that losing young people had a negative impact on the national economy and no government could afford such a loss.

He, however, expressed his pleasure that the first phase of the project had achieved all its goals.

He said that the Monitoring and Evaluation Cell of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government had declared it an effective project.

Published in Dawn, November 21st, 2014