KARACHI: Ahead of the federal budget’s announcement, the Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) has demanded that the government shift national priorities towards primary healthcare, freeze all existing taxes and refrain from imposing new financial burdens.

The association rejected the current health allocation ,which languishes below one per cent of the GDP, demanding that the state allocate a minimum of five percent strictly for healthcare services, prioritising the primary care and prevention tiers.

Highlighting the plight of the common man, the association has emphasised that people are already crushed under the unbearable weight of regressive indirect taxes.

“A poor labourer buying basic kitchen commodities for his household is paying exorbitant taxes; he is drowning under inflated electricity bills and facing crippling travel costs due to massive hikes in petroleum products. Squeezing private medical clinics means a poor man can no longer afford to stay alive,” reads a PMA statement.

It urged the government to divert resources towards primary healthcare, stressing that the provision of healthcare at the grassroots level, focusing on disease prevention, clean drinking water, and sanitation is the ultimate cost-saving tool for the national exchequer.

“By stopping diseases before they spread, the government can save hundreds of billions of rupees currently wasted on advanced, late-stage treatments in collapsing public tertiary-care hospitals.”

Contaminated water, it pointed out, was responsible for nearly 40pc of annual deaths and 30pc of all reported illnesses nationwide, triggering unchecked outbreaks of Extensively Drug-Resistant (XDR) Typhoid and Hepatitis.

“The PMA demands that clean drinking water be funded as a national security priority rather than relying on expensive post-infection treatments.”

It emphasised that treating life-saving medical care as a commercial, taxable commodity infringes on Article 9 of the Constitution (the Fundamental Right to Life) and warned that “weaponising tax machinery against healthcare providers would completely collapse the remaining safety net for Pakistan’s people”.

“The Federal Board of Revenue’s persistent harassment of the medical community is a direct assault on the healthcare of Pakistan’s citizens. It is highly unfortunate that whenever the FBR fails to achieve its tax collection targets, it immediately launches aggressive attacks on the medical community.”

“Instead of hounding doctors, it is time for the rulers to think about the people’s sufferings. The government must immediately reduce its own luxurious, elite lifestyle and take aggressive steps to eliminate rampant corruption across all public sectors, including within the FBR itself.”

The PMA vehemently opposed the FBR’s push to force retail-style point-of-sale (POS) systems and electronic invoicing on small private clinics and diagnostic labs.

Published in Dawn, June 4th, 2026