LAHORE: The Punjab government on Saturday night removed the health secretary as well as senior functionaries of the Punjab Institute of Cardiology and decided to request the Lahore High Court to constitute a judicial inquiry into the deaths of heart patients. The death toll has risen to 109.
At a meeting called to review the matter of rising death toll of heart patients at the Chief Minister’s Secretariat, Shahbaz Sharif ordered to make health secretary Jahanzeb Khan and PIC chief executive Prof Dr Muhammad Azhar officers on special duty.
The chief minister also ordered suspension of PIC Medical Superintendent Dr Saleem Jaffar, Drug Testing Laboratory Director Abdus Salam Mufti, DMS store Dr Ali Hassan, pharmacist Muhammad Yousaf and storekeeper Zulfiqar.
Punjab Agriculture Secretary Capt Arif Nadeem has been given additional charge of health department secretary. The government has also decided to request the Lahore High Court to launch a judicial inquiry into the deaths due to suspected drugs’ reaction.
Meanwhile, the health department officials said the chief minister had removed the top officials while ignoring the fact that he himself held the portfolio of the healthminister.
As regards deaths, a health department official confirmed that Rasheedan Bibi, 60, a resident of Sargodha; Sarwar Begum, 70, a resident of Narowal; and Rehmat, 47, a resident of Samanabad, had died at Services Hospital due to drugs’ reaction. The death toll rose to 109 on Saturday.
While the health department is in denial mode on the number of deaths and claims that 85 deaths have been confirmed, the chief minister had himself announced a couple of days ago that the death toll had risen to 100.
The officials said the health department was also in the process of retrieving drugs in question from the patients.
When contacted, various top officials in the health department claimed that the drugs’ lab reports from within Pakistan were clear whereas the reports from London and France were awaited.
Following reports that the patients were dying due to overdose of the medicine given to them, PIC Medical Superintendent Dr Saleem Jaffar had earlier in the evening denied so.
Dr Jaffar confirmed that the police had called pharmacist Muhammad Yousaf and dispenser Zulfiqar to the Qila Gujjar Singh police station to record their statements.
A health department spokesman has claimed that 37 patients affected by PIC drugs’ reaction had recovered and discharged from various hospitals during the last 24 hours. Overall, 301 affected patients had recovered, he added.