BAHAWALNAGAR: A second inquiry committee has been made on the orders of the caretaker chief minister in the case of a minor girl’s arm being amputated due to alleged negligence by doctors in a private hospital in Bahawalnagar. The first committee was suspended on the chief minister’s direction after the girl’s family expressed their dissatisfaction over its composition.

Muhammad Imran, father of five-year-old girl Horiya from neighbourhood Nizampura, told Dawn that Horiya was taken to the National Hospital when she sustained injuries on her right arm while playing a few days ago. Dr Amjad Tahir, the owner of the hospital and head of the orthopedic ward of the Bahawalnagar DHQ Hospital, operated on her arm after diagnosing it as fractured. Two days after the operation, when they brought the girl back to the hospital as her condition worsened, the doctor amputated her arm, stating that failure to do so would endanger her life.

Imran stated that the department remained silent despite his repeated complaints regarding the negligence of the hospital staff. Rejecting the committee constituted by the Bahawalnagar deputy commissioner, Mr Imran said the district administration appointed colleagues and people who worked as employees in Dr Tahir’s hospital as members of the inquiry committee. The committee was constituted on the orders of the CM Punjab after the issue gained attention on social media on July 1. The CEO of Health was not available for comment.

District Health Authority sources confirmed to Dawn the majority of doctors, including Dr Tahir, either ran Sehat Sahulat Proramme-affiliated private hospitals or worked as partners in these hospitals where not only basic facilities lacked but unqualified and untrained staff performed surgeries.

However, due to the involvement of officials holding major posts in the health authority, the district administration remained silent. Sources said that services in 18 Sahulat-affiliated hospitals across the district were suspended for several days in November 2022 due to the employment of uncertified and bogus anesthetists.

Some qualified anesthetists, requesting anonymity, alleged that several hospitals, with the capacity for only five to 10 surgeries a day, were performing 30 to 50 surgeries without following proper precautions. They added that the ratio was almost 500 times higher compared to the period when these hospitals were not affiliated with the Sehat Sahulat Programme.

The chief ministers office constituted on July 3 a three-member inquiry committee to probe the matter. The committee would include a member of the CM Inspection team and two Healthcare Commission officials. The committee would submit its report to the chief minister in three days.

Published in Dawn, July 6th, 2023