MULTAN: Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid says action will be taken against Nishtar Hospital Medical Superintendent Dr Ashiq Malik if he is held guilty of corruption.

Speaking to journalists here on Wednesday, the minister said Dr Malik would have to face the consequences if corruption allegations against him were established.

“We will not protect anyone involved in the corruption and the PTI government is determined to sternly deal with the corrupt,” she said.

On Feb 11, the Anti-Corruption Establishment director general approved judicial action against Dr Malik and others for their alleged involvement in the purchase of medicines beyond requirement and a case was also lodged by the ACE Multan.

She said the PTI government was going to issue health cards in Multan, Muzaffargarh, Dera Ghazi Khan and Rajanpur from Feb 22 through which the poor would be able to avail themselves of prescription, treatment and medicines worth Rs0.7 million from both public and private hospitals.

She said 7.2 million families would be provided health cards across the province and this task would be completed till the end of the ongoing year.

“Besides nine common diseases, the card holding families will be able to get the facility of tests relating to neurosciences and cardiac lab tests. If the facilities are not available in government hospitals, services of private hospitals will be hired for this purpose,” she added.

She said the programme was going to be initiated through an agreement with the State Life Insurance. She said 70pc of the patients were getting treatment facilities from private hospitals. She said the expenses of burial in case of death of any poor patient and three-day wages to the injured labourer would be given, while Rs1,000 would be given as fare expenses in case the patient had to travel far and meals would also be provided in the hospital to the members of card holding family.

She said an installment of Rs13.80 billion had been paid so that people could get benefit of these cards that would be distributed without any political favour. The commissioners and deputy commissioners had been asked to verify the deserving people, she said.

The provincial government, she said, had allocated Rs32 billion for the distribution of free medicines and procedure to procure and distribute the medicines had also been changed.

“A special secretary on a daily basis is monitoring the provision of medicines to the hospitals. If a hospital is facing the shortage of medicines, the shortage is being countered by providing medicines from the stock of other hospitals. Medicines worth Rs5 billion are stocked in the office of the director general health,” she said.

She said the performance of the mobile health units could not be improved despite monitoring. The procedure had been changed by handing over six units to the Nishtar Hospital and these units would provide health facilities to the people of far-flung areas and districts.

“As many as 20 diagnostic units for this purpose have also been purchased out of which 12 have been received,” she said.

She said one hospital each would be established in Rajanpur, Layyah, Muzaffargarh, Attock and Mianwali.

She said the 500-bed Nishtar-II would be established on 58-acre land in Mauza Bulail where the campus for Nishtar Medical University would also be set up. She said efforts were under way to change the attitude of the doctors and paramedical staff with the patients.

She said 6,800 doctors had been hired to overcome the shortage of medical practitioners in government hospitals. She said the chief justice was making her answerable for the actions by former chief minister Shahbaz Sharif in connection with the affairs of the Punjab Kidney and Liver Institute.

Irked by the shortage of the life-saving medicines and poor cleanliness arrangements at the Nishtar Hospital, the minister expressed her displeasure in the syndicate meeting of the Nishtar Medical University and directed that the MS should perform his duties honestly and ensure cleanliness in the hospital, attendance of doctors and staff, and provision of free medicines.

She said special committees from next week would inspect the government hospitals and prepare reports regarding cleanliness, attendance of doctors and availability of medicines.

The meeting directed the hospital administration to reduce the contract amount of repairing of dialysis and CT scan machines from $96,000 to $74,000, and send the PC-I for the construction of library and residential block to the Higher Education Commission.

Published in Dawn, February 14th, 2019