Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid has emphasised on the need for a concrete and long lasting health policy and said that focus on rural health centres is crucial for Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a report in the local media has informed.
While addressing an inaugural session of consultative workshop on development of national health policy and provincial strategic framework Thursday, Dr Rashid said that Pakistan was facing lack of health facilities and rural areas, in particular were badly neglected.
She added that the country was facing double burden of diseases, with the burden higher on the poor. Dr Rashid shared that many of these condition can be controlled at a relatively low cost and best practices through primary and secondary care level.
Moreover, she said health system faces challenges of vertical service delivery structure in low performance accountability within the government, creating efficiency and quality issues.
She suggested that pyramid of medical facilities should be reversed and focus should be shifted to rural areas.
She also mentioned the complications, such as smog, which have risen due to climate change and regretted that man himself was responsible for these disturbances.
