LAHORE: Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz launched the ‘Free Medicine Delivery Project’ for 200,000 patients in the province on Saturday by visiting the houses of a couple of cardiac patients to deliver free medicines.

The CM also inaugurated the Sahulat Markaz at the Punjab Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department and formally restarted the registration process of TB and hepatitis patients.

Speaking on the occasion, the CM said: “We have launched such a mega public welfare project in a short span of eight weeks”.

She said Nawaz Sharif and Shehbaz Sharif had launched medicines home delivery projects in 2013 but the previous government of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) stopped it.

“The ministers kept on receiving their salaries but deprived the poor of medicines with the closure of this project,” she alleged and claimed that the government extended the scope of this project to all the cities of Punjab.

Under the project, the CM said, 200,000 patients would be delivered medicines at their doorstep.

“Two months’ medicines stock for the hepatitis, TB and cardiac patients will be delivered at the doorstep of the patients who will be delivered medicines again after undergoing checkup.” She said the patients should not face any hassle in hospitals.

“Some 32 field hospitals have been functional to provide treatment facilities to the people belonging to rural areas. The air ambulance project will be launched for the poor patients in the coming few weeks.”

Ms Maryam said a state-of-the-art health facility in every city should have cardiology, pediatrics and cancer treatment facilities.

The CM inspected the Drug Testing Laboratory being established to check the quality of medicines. She visited chromatography, drug release laboratory, drug sample receiving area and hepatitis reference/public health laboratory. She laid the foundation stone of the Primary & Secondary Healthcare Development Wing.

Published in Dawn, May 5th, 2024