PESHAWAR, July 7: The ruling Awami National Party has failed to implement its own health policy owing to lack of coordination between the health department and the Chief Minister’s Secretariat, sources said.

The Malgary Doctoran, a group of pro-ANP doctors, had prepared a 31-page health policy that had been approved by the party’s top leadership.

It was on the occasion of the oath-taking ceremony of the provincial cabinet of the Malgary Doctoran in August 2006 that party chief Asfandyar Wali Khan had directed the affiliated wing to chalk out a health policy for the party’s manifesto, which would be put into practice whenever the party came into power. Subsequently, a committee was formed, which drafted the health policy over a period of six months. The draft was adopted by the ANP as the party’s policy.

“Several doctors have put in their efforts and prepared a document, but now it has been shelved,” said a senior doctor associated with the Malgary Doctoran.

However, despite the ANP’s victory in the February 18 election the policy could not be implemented because the finance ministry has been given to its coalition partner in the provincial government, the Pakistan People’s Party. “We feel let down because the ANP should have got the health ministry so that it could implement its own health policy,” the doctor said.

Former principal of Khyber Medical College Prof Sirajuddin Ahmed, former secretary for health Dr Ali Sher Khan and senior paediatrician and former health minister Prof Meher Taj Roghani had also approved the document before submitting it to the ANP leadership.

The draft had been prepared after studying several provincial and national health policies.

Of late, the Malgary Doctoran has been campaigning for implementation of the health policy, but such efforts have been fruitless. A delegation of the Malgary Doctoran has held meetings with the chief minister, who belongs to the ANP, and apprised him of their grievances. The delegation has also met the health minister and the secretary for health.

A senior doctor said it had been observed that there was a lack of working relationship between the Chief Minister’s Secretariat and the health department, adding that the coalition partners -- ANP and PPP -- in the provincial government should have formulated a strategy to ensure reforms in health and other important sectors. Unfortunately, he said, there was no coherent strategy.

“Implementation of the ANP-devised health policy has taken a back seat and the health department is busy with the petty issue of postings and transfers of officials,” he said.

According to him, once the policy was implanted, people would see marked improvement in the health delivery system. The draft policy points out that although health is a provincial subject, resources are allocated for the sector by the federal government due to lack of provincial autonomy.

In the present scenario, the provinces cannot negotiate directly with international donors.

The situation is worst in the Frontier province because it has traditionally been not in the good books of the federal government.

The province’s health system, it states, is concentrated in cities, which has lead to tremendous and unregulated growth of the private health sector. A majority of people of the province are poor and cannot visit private clinics.

The draft mentions flaws in the existing system and suggests ways and means to improve it.