Rs 5.2 billion allocated for safe drinking water, sewerage facilities in Punjab

A sum of Rs 5.2 billion has been allocated for providing clean, safe drinking water and sewerage facilities to the people of Punjab, Provincial Health Minister Dr Tahir Ali Javed said on Thursday.
Talking to PTV he said, provincial public health engineering department was being revamped for speedy completion of the projects aiming to ensure supply of pure water to masses. Additionally, federal government would install filtration plants at each tehsil of the country till the end of 2007, he added.
As a long-term strategy all faulty pipelines would be replaced in various phases.
He said Rs100 billion had been allocated for conducting development programmes in the province, adding about 55 percent had been reserved for the development of social sector like, roads, health, education, agriculture.
Six years ago total development fund was only Rs 13 billion. He said, likewise Rs 600 million was reserved for the development of special education sector, Rs 300 million would be spent during 2006-07 for enhancing literacy level in the province.
The total development budget of health in Punjab is Rs 5.2 billion, in 2003 it was only Rs 870 million, he added.
About 400 percent increase has been made as compared to previous years. Non-development budget of health has increased only 100 percent, he said.
He said the non-development health budget had been enhanced from Rs3.3bn to Rs 4.3 billion while Rs 0.9 billion would be spent on providing emergency services to patients in various hospitals of Punjab.
There were three cardiac units across Punjab. Three burn units had been added in the province. State of the art ambulance services 1122 are being expanded at tehsil level, he informed.
Two medical universities had been established, while two medical universities would be built this year, he added. He said Rs 5.5 billion would be spent for upgrading 295 rural health centres and 2,500 basic health units (BHUs) within next two years.
He added, each Medical officer would be paid monthly stipend of Rs 27,000. That was why 85 percent posts of males and 60 percent females' posts had already been filled, he said.