Punjab Chief Minister Pervaiz Elahi on Saturday announced an amount of Rs 1 billion for improving delivery of emergency health services at teaching hospitals in the province.
Addressing the 10th National Surgical Conference at Fatima Jinnah Medical College here on Saturday, he said that ambulance services have been started from the Punjab capital with the initial amount of Rs 10 million.
He said that ambulances being provided by Punjab government are fully equipped with latest medical equipment and can function as complete units and that they would be separately managed and facilitate ailing people in teaching hospitals.
The service has been initiated from Lahore with an initial cost of Rs 100 million.
Narrating his personal experience, he recalled that once he, along with health minister, paid a visit to the emergency ward of a prominent hospital in the guise of a common man. Except the doctor, he said, everything was in disorder.
Deeply moved, he said, he decided to improve conditions in emergency wards instead of taking action against the concerned officials.
He said his government, therefore, has decided to allocate Rs 1 billion for emergency wards of teaching hospitals.
During an inspection of a hospital, the Chief Minister said, he questioned a doctor about his poor performance and the doctor told him that he could not do better with a salary of Rs 6,000 per month.
Therefore, when he announced increase in the monthly stipend of post-graduate doctors doing specialisation, the news was received with resounding applause.
The Chief Minister reiterated that his government was determined to provide health care to the ailing community at the doorsteps.
He said that rural, basic and tehsil health centres would be strengthened.
In this connection, he said a concrete strategy has been evolved to improve the rural health network and added that a pilot health project has already been launched from Rahim Yar Khan.
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