FAISALABAD, Aug 12: A Samundri Tehsil Headquarters Hospital child specialist, who spilled the beans of polio cases before the media, has been awarded suspension from service, Dawn learnt on Tuesday.

The district administration hastened to take the decision after the doctor informed journalists about the suspected cases of polio at Samundri’s villages.

Sources said the emergence of many polio cases at Samundri baffled the district administration which had been receiving million of rupees for vaccination of children under five. It was trying to conceal such cases, they said, and instant action against the doctor was a clear-cut message to the health practitioners not to divulge the instances of polio.

They said the district officer for health learnt that Dr Amin was the man who gave the media the count of polio cases at Samundri. The district managers, sources said, had previously been concealing such cases from the media for fear of criticism as the growing number of polio cases brought infamy to the country’s healthcare system.

Quoting an instance, they said, the administration kept the case of 11-month-old Kashf secret. The girl was brought to the THQ hospital on Aug 8 and remained under treatment till Aug 11. The hospital authorities tactfully asked the mother to leave the hospital as they declared Kashf fit, though actually she had not recovered.

The girl’s mother, while speaking to Dawn, claimed that the doctors discharged her daughter with the claim that she was well. But the fact is that she can’t move her right leg and arm even now. She said the girl had developed the disease eight days ago.

Meanwhile, a World Health Organization team visited the THQ hospital to obtain information about the suspected cases of polio. EDO (Health) Dr Siddique told newsmen that it was not certain that the children had been suffering from polio. He said their stool samples had been forwarded to a laboratory in Islamabad, which would make the picture clear.

As for the child specialist’s suspension, he said: “The doctor was not authorised to utter even a single word about the issue. It is the government’s responsibility to inform the media about this issue.”