The provincial health department has failed to impalement the Healthcare Commission Bill 2013 in the province despite the passage of nine months disappointing the health experts and leaders of the Pakistan Medical Association (PMA).
Pakistan Medical Association, Centre, Secretary General Mirza Ali Azhar said the Sindh Assembly passed an important Healthcare Commission Bill 2013 in the beginning of this year aimed at improving healthcare quality, protecting patients’ rights, doctors’ safety at healthcares, monitoring of public and private hospitals and ending practice of quackery in the medical field.
He said unfortunately authorities had completely failed to implement this bill. He said the PMA had drafted the bill with hectic efforts but no mechanism had been finalised so far how to practically implement it in the province.
He said the PMA demanded to enforce this bill in the province in order to resolve public problems linked with healthcare. He said the provincial government had failed to implement the bill despite the passage of several months.
He said death of people in hospitals due to negligence of doctors and reaction of medicines could happen anywhere in the world and implementation of the bill was necessary to get the health care system of the province on the smooth way. He said healthcare bill was patient-friendly which would certainly put an end on the practice of quackery.
PMA Karachi President Prof Idrees Adhi, who played key role in the drafting of the bill, said the bill would help the authorities concerned in reducing the violence against the doctors. He said the doctors community was frustrated and disappointed over government’s cold attitude towards implementation of the bill.
He said there was no platform for patients to complain against healthcare practitioners in case of negligence thus violence against doctors had been rising. He said the Punjab government had successfully approved such a bill and also implemented it across the province but the provincial government of Sindh was reluctant to do so.
He lamented that the provincial government was getting unnecessary bills like the Sindh Nursing Bill 2014 approved but no one was ready to implement an already approved bill. He said the PMA almost spent four year in drafting and getting approval of the health bill from the Sindh Assembly but unfortunately authorities concerned were not sincere to enforce it.
