LARKANA, April 9: The president of the College of Physicians and Surgeons Pakistan, Prof M. Sultan Farooqui, has called for increasing GDP allocations for the health sector to address challenges of high maternal and infant mortality rate in the country amidst rapidly multiplying population.

Speaking at the inaugural ceremony of the CPSP regional centre in Larkana on Saturday, he said the college was stressing on producing more and more specialists in 52 disciplines of the medical science.

He said Pakistan was at number seven in population growth in the world and on number two in Muslim countries, which demanded redoubling of efforts to address the issue.

He said the CPSP had produced 13,000 postgraduates and about 7,000 more specialists would be produced in the next four years.

Mr Farooqui said at present more than 40 specialists were working in Larkana and the CPSP had planned to provide specialists at the sub-divisional level with the object to serve maximum population.

He said the CPSP had begun spreading its network in the interior of Sindh and established its regional centres in Hyderabad, Nawabshah and Larkana.

He said the Larkana center had online facilities due to which the candidates would have access to 12,000 medical journals.

He said the CPSP regional centre would provide state-of-the-art facilities to candidates of Sukkur, Shikarpur, Jacobabad, Ghotki, Khairpur and adjoining areas of Punjab and Balochistan.

He said England, Ireland, Saarc and Middle East countries had recognized the postgraduate degree of the CPSP.

Talks are underway with the Canadian government for the purpose and he was optimistic that very shortly the country would recognize it.

The CPSP fellows are running the main unit of anaesthesia in whole Ireland, he said.

Chandka Medical College principal Prof Sikandar Shaikh said Rs1 million were being spent on purchasing books besides the candidates would have an access to online repository of medical science.