Punjab Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif, in a meeting, gave approval to different measures regarding improvement of the healthcare system.
The meeting decided to increase the number of beds in hospitals of Sahiwal, Dera Ghazi Khan, Sialkot and Gujranwala to 500 and to link these hospitals with medical colleges. The approval was granted for the step of releasing a one-line budget for health sector and giving complete financial and administrative autonomy to medical superintendents of district and tehsil headquarters hospitals. The budget will be directly transferred to the medical superintendent of the concerned hospital in future, he added. The medical superintendents will be authorised to take action against the doctors of up to grade 17, nurses and other staff, and will be responsible for the improvement of health facilities in the hospitals.
The chief minister said the manufacturers and sellers of substandard medicines are the enemy of humanity and added that the elements involved in such heinous business deserve no leniency.
Sharif said that no person will be allowed to prepare and sell poison in the name of medicines. He said that provision of quality health facilities to the people is his mission and he will fulfill it at all costs.
He further said that decision has been taken to computerise the system of the entire process of supply order, purchase, provision to the hospitals, stock and distribution of medicines to the patients and medicine procurement software has also been developed for making system of medicines transparent.
He said that Khwaja Imran Nazir will be the chairman of a provincial taskforce for the elimination of spurious and substandard drugs. The chief minister approved the reforms for reorganisation of the provincial quality control board and directed to take indiscriminate action against drug inspectors involved in corruption. He said that the office of chief drug controller will also be reorganised. A comprehensive system is being implemented for the improvement of health sector, he added.
