KARACHI, Feb 18: The provincial health department has enforced emergency in all its major units in Karachi as well as in rest of the province on account of 9th and 10th Muharram.

Secretary Health Dr Naushad Shaikh told Dawn that leaves of all the paramedical staff and doctors had been cancelled and special arrangements had been made at all the public sector hospitals to meet any emergency situation. He said that arrangements had also been made at the emergency wards of Civil Hospital, Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre and Abbasi Shaheed Hospital.

This year, he said, special teams of the health department comprising paramedics and doctors would accompany Pakistan Rangers along the route of the procession on 9th and 10th Muharram.

He said that these medical teams would be using the ambulances of Civil Hospital and Lyari General Hospital. Earlier in 2004, private hospitals played an important role in managing the large scale emergencies in the month of May following suicide bombings in mosques, as the government hospitals had initially failed to cope with the unending influx of dead and the wounded.