LAHORE: Punjab Minister for Information and Culture Fayyazul Hassan Chohan Saturday urged the need to improve the health and education sectors instead of launching mass transit projects.
Addressing a conference organised by Pakistan Society of Family Physicians (PSFP), Chohan said the incumbent government has extended the facility of health insurance cards to the all 36 districts of the province apart from increasing their credit limit from Rs300,000 to Rs360,000.
“In addition to this, the vacant seats for doctors and paramedics in the province will also be filled soon.”
Taking a jibe at the previous Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government, the minister lamented that the former paid more attention towards the metro bus and orange train instead of improving the province’s health and education infrastructure.
“The so-called ‘Khadime Aala’ curtailed the budget allocated for health and education and spent it on mass transit projects,” he said.
“The PML-N government also appointed a person more interested in land business as its health minister.”
The minister regretted that several simmering issues confronting the health community, mainly the young doctors’ reservations, were not addressed within the past ten years.
“The former chief minister spent most of his time on photoshoots instead of actually doing something for the people of Punjab. Unlike the previous Punjab government’s performance, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) introduced several revolutionary reforms in the health sector, which benefited the common people.”
Following the KP model, he went on to say, the Punjab government, on the directives of Prime Minister Imran Khan and under the leadership of Chief Minister Sardar Usman Buzdar, is now introducing similar reforms in Punjab.