Gratifying, indeed, it is to learn from a Recorder Report that the Sindh government is mulling over a reward package, especially for the doctors serving in rural hospitals. This has reference to the heartening observations, which the Sindh Minister for Health, Shabbir Ahmed Qaimkhani, made at the distribution ceremony of medical equipment, instruments, and ambulances to the newly carved districts from the ex-Hyderabad district.
Of the content of the proposed package with higher salary, it will be supplemented with loaning facility of up to Rs 0.150 million to each doctor. It will, thus, be noted that the underlying idea behind the contemplated gesture is to address the major problem in the way of qualified doctors in serving in the rural areas.
Viewed in the light of the resentment, which the minister voiced over the reluctance, particularly, of the doctors, having received their medical education on the basis of rural domicile, in serving their own people, the new approach will appear to have resulted from an objective comprehension of the overall situation in the rural areas.
This should become, all the more evident, from the concern over the deteriorating conditions of basic health units and rural health centres. For as he rightly pointed out, due to lack of facilities and existence of ghost employees, 90 percent poor people remained victims of neglect.
That the health delivery system, particularly in the rural areas, remains plagued by too many problems, even over half a century after independence, really makes a sad commentary on our performance. This is, however, not to say that no effort has ever been made in the desired direction in the social sectors.
Reference, in this regard, may especially be made to opening of more and more hospitals and health centres, in the remote backward areas to cater to the crying needs of a fast multiplying population. It cannot also be denied either the fact that while expanding medical facilities for the people, some emphasis has been laid on equipping many hospitals with latest diagnostic and therapeutic devices, notwithstanding, insufficiency of financial resources.
The same should apply, in varying degrees, to the concern for ensuring adequate number of doctors, specialists included, to treat the seriously sick among the patients. However, it is another matter that largely due to paucity of funds, it has not been possible to provide all this everywhere and for every class of the people, including the extremely poor, in the rural areas, to which the teeming millions belong.
However, as in other areas of economic and social activity, what appears to have largely remained un-remedied is the human problem, critical to a fairly large part of the workforce, in the most important departments of medical care. This refers also in no insignificant a manner to the doctors, on which focus has been laid in the proposed package. For one thing, the salary they earn for rendering what needs be regarded essentially a humanitarian service, seems to have been found too meagre to ensure their own respectable survival, thereby aversely affecting their efficiency.
This also applies to their working conditions that have continued to leave a great deal to be desired. Now that the health minister has pointed out that, of Rs 41.266 million package for ex-district Hyderabad, under the SDSSP, the equipment and ambulances worth Rs 24.305 million are being distributed among the newly created districts, and to Hyderabad itself, it will appear that the new thrust encompasses a much wider area of medical care. One hopes that the provincial government will vigorously pursue it with a keen sense of devotion all over the province, while also inspiring the civil society organisations to supplement government efforts too.
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