PESHAWAR: The health department has drawn up a plan to achieve the targets set forth by the federal government to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations by 2030.

As first step, a 16-member Human Resource for Health (HRH) working group has been notified under chairmanship of the additional secretary health (establishment) to give inputs for setting up a special unit to work towards achieving the goals in line with UN’s SDGs 3 in the next 12 years.

The HRH unit would work at the health department specifically on matters relating to the SDGs’ requirements and strategies to meet them in due course of time.

Working group to give input for achievement of targets

Currently, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata have 40,635 essential mix workforce including doctors and specialists, nurses, midwives and lady health workers. The workforce needs to be raised to 114,792 during the stipulated period.

The federal government has unveiled Pakistan HRH vision-2018-2030 on April 4 and the provinces are required to begin their strategies to fill the gaps in the workforce.

The HRH unit would work towards achievement of the target with a view to improve patients’ care in accordance with UN’s criteria.

Pakistan has 1.4 mixed essential workforces for a 10,000 population, which according to the SDGs should be 4.45. The current status of the workforce varies from province to province with Sindh having two but mostly working in Karachi, the capital city of the province.

To get the goals, the health department will establish an HRH cell to devise plan to reach the target in line with the national vision.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata require the services of 18,824 more doctors to be able to cater to the healthcare needs of the population.

The strategy would take into account the skilled mixed workforce of public and private sector and would look out for ways and means to fill the gaps between the currently available professionals and the requirements.

According to the plan, the health department’s working group has been tasked to furnish suggestions and technical advice for achieving the targets in the fulfillment of the Pakistan HRH vision.

Additionally, the group is required to review current policies, guidelines and code of practices, perform gap analysis and give recommendations regarding development of new policies, guidelines and code of practices to meet the targets besides having quarterly review meetings on performance of HRH cell.

Officials said that health department would work in collaboration with the federal government and would appraise it about the developments in that regard. They said that after passage of 18th Amendment in 2010, health affairs were devolved to provinces but federal government was still leading the provinces about commitments with international organisations.

“Pakistan, being signatory to the UN’s SDGs, is required to work towards the achievement of the targets,” said officials. They said that the province would also take into account the attrition of the workforce to make practicable strategies and meet the challenges and fill the prevalent gaps effectively.

Published in Dawn, April 11th, 2018