PESHAWAR: The shortage of staff has been hampering the performance of the Sehat Sahulat Programme started by health department to provide free treatment to the deserving population, according to sources.

They said that the programme, launched by the health department in January 2016, was facing acute shortage of staff and was not able to perform to a desired level. Initially, the programme was started to cover 1.8 million families but the number was increased to 2.4 million in 2018 while the staff consisted of only four technical people including one director, two deputy directors and one monitoring and evaluation officer. They have been tasked to run the programme in the entire province.

“The government has approved 60 posts for the programme but owing to the lengthy and complicated process, the hiring process is yet to begin,” said sources.

Only four technical persons run the programme in entire province

Initially the programme was launched as a project and the staff was given Rs30,000 per month allowance but the government withdrew the same after the programme was shifted to regular side of the health department.

All the doctors in the health department have been getting health professional allowance of Rs56,000 a month but those working in the SSP don’t get the same.

“The employees have been requesting the health department for HPA but the file is shuttling between the accountant general office and health department,” said sources. All the technical people working in SSP are from management cadre of the health department and their colleagues throughout in the province are getting the allowance.

The Prime Minister National Programme launched last year has been giving salaries between Rs300,000 to Rs1 million to technical people working in Punjab and federal capital despite the snail’s pace working. The new government is replicating SSP in the whole country. The government is providing treatment to the designated population through State Life Insurance Corporation (SLIC) and has so far spent Rs4.55 billion on the treatment of 1,18,200 patients since January 1, 2017.

The SLIC hasn’t been able to register the target population on time as 900,000 people are yet to be traced. It has so far registered only 115,000 households of the 669,184 target for new families in 2018.

The registration of families was 85 per cent last year. The SSP has not been monitoring SLIC properly due to shortage of staff and requires more people to be able to implement the programme effectively.

“The federal government has already announced extension of the programme to erstwhile Fata that would not be possible if human resources are not increased,” said sources.

The SSP is required to take care of administrative and procurement issues in addition to contract management, financing, planning, budgeting, accounts and audit, information technology, manage data, carry out analysis, develop and manage website, issue treatment guidelines, ensure quality and receive complaints and work to address the same.

It is also responsible for enrollment of designated families, printing and distribution of Sehat Insaf Cards, assessment of the progress and contracts with hospitals along with awareness campaigns via electronic, print and social media as well as holding seminars at the community level to inform the people about the programme.

Published in Dawn, September 20th, 2018