Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif on Tuesday made it mandatory for physicians and general practitioners to take part in training courses held in all medical colleges of Lahore from October 26 for which they will be issued certificates of participation.
He was chairing a meeting of the dengue emergency committee to review measures against dengue. The CM said that high dependency units for dengue patients had started functioning in Multan, Faisalabad, Rawalpindi, Gujranwala and Sheikhupura and doctors working at these centres were trained by senior doctors in Lahore.
He said that although dengue was a menace but it provided an opportunity to judge the performance of various departments and in view of their flaws and shortcomings, corrective measures will be adopted for moving forward.
Shahbaz said that surveillance committees pointing out presence of larvae visited thousands of places and in the light of their reports, the district government and other departments took necessary measures for its eradication. Reviewing pace of progress on the project of setting up blood bank, the CM said that the Punjab government had decided to establish a mechanism at the provincial level for supply of blood to the injured as well as other patients and donors will be registered.
Separately, Punjab Health Secretary Jahanzeb Khan said that with awareness among masses, a receding trend was witnessed in dengue cases and death rate. Giving a briefing at King Edward Medical University (KEMU) about dengue outbreak in the province, the secretary observed that October was the month of decline for dengue unlike the past four years when it was a peak season of the epidemic. He said that instructions were issued to doctors and butchers for prevention of congo virus on Eidul Azha, as this virus infected humans from blood of infected animals.
