Patients irked by govt health failure

KHANEWAL-The District Headquarters (DHQ) Hospital Khanewal is unable to provide medical facilities while the Rs60 million Trauma Centre project announced in 2013 is yet to be completed, local people said.

Hospital staff and the patients said there is no vaccine for the hepatitis patients for last one year at DHQ Hospital. The population of the district is almost 4 million while there are only 16 beds in the emergency ward of the DHQ Hospital. There is no operation theatre in the emergency of the hospital so the doctors are forced to refer the patients in critical condition to the Nishtar Hospital Multan, which is at a distance of more than one hour drive. Thus, majority of such patients are unable to survive and only lucky ones reach the Multan hospital.

To meet with these problems of emergency, the Punjab government had announced a Trauma centre for the hospital in 2013, with an estimated cost of Rs60 million. Building for the Trauma centre is almost complete but the government seems to have been busy with other projects like Metro buses and train in Multan and many others and no one bothers about the serious emergency patients of Khanewal.

Many politicians and bureaucrats had laid the foundation stone of Trauma centre but it is the example of the interest of the local and Punjab government in healthcare. According to sources, the number of hepatitis patients is more than one thousand who are waiting for the vaccine. However, according to the hospital sources, the vaccine is not available for last one year in the DHQ Hospital.

According to patients, it looks as if the government is interested only in expanding a network of admin officials instead of providing healthcare for the patients. More than 50 percent of the area of DHQ Khanewal is residential area of the officials and doctors, all facilities are available for them. Nevertheless, the building for the extension of medical wards is under construction for a long time and work is stopped on the project.

There is another piece of land and building of the old hospital which is under the use of CEO Health and his staff. So District Khanewal is spending a lot of funds on the maintenance of these offices and residences. It should also spend on the basic health facilities, the people demanded.

Source: The Nation