Provincial Minister for Excise & Taxation and Finance Mujtaba Shuja-ur-Rehman has said that in order to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), record funds are being provided to health and education sectors and the major focus of the government is on protecting the health of people trough strengthening of Primary Health Care & Disease Preventive Programmes.
He said that resources worth billions of rupees have been allocated for provision of education, health and other basic facilities in the current fiscal year budget. He said that special attention is being paid to the provision of best treatment facilities to the people of far-flung areas especially remote areas of South Punjab and Rs one billion has been provided for mobile health units. He said that more resources will be provided for the uplift of socio-economic status of the masses belonging to downtrodden areas.
While talking to party workers at Shalimar Town, Mujtaba Shuja-ur Rehman said that government is focusing for the treatment of chronic & fatal diseases. He said that for imparting modern education to the students Rs 274 billion will be spent on education sector during the current fiscal year which is 26.25 percent of the total budget of the province.
Mujtaba Shuja-ur Rehman said that government was encouraging the NGOs as well as educational institutions for organising awareness events against fatal diseases. He said that Punjab government has provided additional budget for the provision of health services in Punjab. He said that by increasing the health budget up to 121.80 billion rupees, the present government has ensured modern health facilities and free medicines as well as air-conditioning in general wards to poor and resource-less people. He told that with a cost or Rs 4 billion health insurance card will be issued so that to provide state of the art healthcare facilities even in private health institutions to the poor card holder patients. He said that Rs 60 crore has been reserved for dialysis facilities to the poor kidney patients. He said that huge amount of Rs 8.75billon is being spent on the provision of free treatment and medicines to the poor and destitute in public sector hospitals of the province.
Mujtaba Shuja-ur-Rehman said that Institute of Neuro Sciences will provide opportunities for the promotion of neurosurgery in Punjab as well as training and updating the knowledge of doctors. He said that brain tumour is completely curable disease and all facilities of neurosurgery are available in the country, early diagnosis can enhance the possibilities for complete recovery. Huge resources are being spent on the rapid development of the province, promotion of quality education, elimination of ignorance and unemployment as well as provision of prompt and inexpensive justice to the masses, he concluded.