HYDERABAD, Jan 16: The leaders of the Liaquat University Hospital Doctors and Patients’ Welfare Forum have complained that there was an acute shortage of registrars in the hospital and medicines were not being provided in the emergency wards.
In a joint statement issued on Wednesday, Dr. Mehmood Soomro, Dr. Bashir Jamali and Dr. Nasrullah Amir alleged that whatever medicines were available were given to the influential patients while the poor patients were ignored.
They said that the reports issued by the pathology laboratories had lost their credibility, and added that when these matters were brought to the notice of the medical superintendent Liaquat University Hospital he had shown his helplessness.
They said that costly medicines were prescribed for poor patients after taking commission from the representatives of pharmaceutical companies.
They expressed surprise that there was no library in the hospital although the university was now awarding post-graduate degrees.
The doctors said that house job doctors were being made to pay Rs500 per month for hostel accommodation although previously no hostel fee was charged from them, and added that the hostel rooms had been allotted to outsiders.
They said that the medical superintendent had made it clear that he could not eject the outsiders from the hostels as police had failed to cooperate.
They appealed to the higher authorities to take serious notice of these issues and redress the grievances of the doctors and the poor patients.
POLIO ERADICATION: The district polio eradication committee, Hyderabad, at a meeting held on Wednesday finalized the anti- polio programme being launched in the district from Jan 22.
The meeting was held under the chairmanship of the Zila Nazim, Dr. Makhdoom Rafiquzzaman.
Addressing the meeting, Dr Makhdoom said that all the resources should be harnessed to make the anti-polio campaign a resounding success.
He said that he along with the Nazims of all the union councils and tehsils as well as the councillors will take part in the anti- polio drive.
He appointed the district officer, Health, Dr. Ashfaq Bhutto as the district focal person while Dr. Nasir Jamal was appointed district person for social mobilization of the campaign.
The president, PMA, Sindh Chapter, Dr. Noor M. Memon and a member of the Rotary Club, Dr. Ahuja, were appointed as members of the finance committee. The latter will also be in charge of minorities.
The EDO (health), Dr. Qadir Bux Memon briefed the meeting about the three-day polio campaign.
Dr. M. Azmoudeh of the WHO offered full cooperation to make the campaign a success.
The representatives of police, revenue, education, Auqaf, national programme and information department attended the meeting.
STUDENTS’ PROTEST: The BDS students of the Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences, Jamshoro, staged a protest demonstration outside the press club here on Wednesday against the poor bi-annual BDS examination results for the year 1999-2000.
Speaking at the rally, the student leaders, Niaz Hussain Kolachi, Khalid Haider Memon and Zohaib Channar, said that 26 students had appeared in the examination out of which 16 students were declared fail.
They demanded that the answer books should be rechecked.