Govt to outsource BHUs to ensure healthcare at doorstep

LAHORE
Adviser to Chief Minister Punjab on Health Khawaja Salman Rafique has said the government will not hesitate to outsource the Basic Health Units (BHUs) to ensure the provision of health facilities on the doorstep of the people.
“The grant of age relaxation for medical teachers and doctors will be need based and it will be given only in those institutions where the medical teachers are required immediately,” he said this while addressing a consultative meeting arranged by the Policy and Strategy Planning Unit (PSPU) of the Health Department at a local hotel on Wednesday for considering the age relaxation proposal for contract appointments of medical teachers and medical officers for BHUs. Secretary Health Jawad Rafique Malik, DG Health Dr. Zahid Pervaiz, Project Director PSPU Ali Bahadur Qazi, retired and in-service principals, professors of medical colleges, members of Chief Minister Health Roadmap Team, EDOs Health of different districts, medical superintendents of government hospitals, representatives of PRSP, PMA, and health experts attended the meeting.
Khawaja Salman Rafique said the government’s responsibility was to provide budget, policymaking and ensure implementation on it, and the officers were the main source to implement the government policies in the field. He said the decentralisation of powers was essential for good governance.
The participants of the meeting expressed their views and gave different proposals on the issue. An analysis of the recommendations and views of the participants was presented by the organisers according to which 59 percent gave their consent to age relaxation up to 65 years to the doctors while 12 percent recommended relaxation of age up to 70 years whereas 14 percent opposed the proposal.
Secretary Health Jawad Rafique Malik said we had to find a solution to the problem at any cost. He observed that if retired professors and doctors could run medical colleges/hospitals of private sector then why the government should not benefit from their services even after the retirement. The secretary health said the government was producing a doctor in only Rs.18,000 per annum even then our BHUs were not fully occupied by the medical officers. He said that after vigorous efforts 66 percent vacancies of medical officers at BHUs had been filled. He said the government had to arrange an alternate solution if young doctors would not go to the BHUs and relaxation in the age for contract appointment of a doctor was one of the options. Similarly, the same policy will be adopted at medical colleges to overcome the shortage of medical teachers. Jawad Rafique Malik said it would be a need based policy. He said the government would also resolve the issues of infrastructure of health centres and doctors’ security. He said the survey of deserted BHUs would be conducted through EDOs Health and such non-functional health centres would be shifted to a building in the populous area to provide treatment facilities to the people.
He said the chief minister had given a special package of Rs.1.5 billion for specialist doctors at the DHQ and THQ hospitals and the specialist doctors started to join these hospitals. He said that different packages and steps were being considered to make functional the BHUs. However, immediate solution to cope with the shortage of medical teachers and doctors is to give age relaxation for their contract appointment for specific period.
Kh. Salman Rafique observed that at the retirement of professors, the department of that facility became headless in various teaching hospitals due to which not only patients faced difficulties but under trainee FCPs doctors also faced hardships of their training. He said the rules were prepared for the welfare of people which could be amended or changed according to the requirement of the hour. DG Health Dr. Zahid Pervaiz said that results of consultative meetings were very encouraging and a fruitful debate on the subject was carried out, which would be helpful for decision making. He said that by introducing the latest monitoring tools, e-monitoring and dashboard everything came in black and white and now nobody could hide their good or bad performance.
Meanwhile, a delegation of Save the Children Pakistan Programme led by its Country Director Ms Farhana Faruqi Stocker called on Chief Minister’s Health Adviser Khawaja Salman Rafique in his office at Punjab Assembly. According to a press release issued here Wednesday, the delegation discussed its project activities, including Diarrhoea Prevention & Control Programme in Punjab with multi-sectoral approach involving Health, Local Government & Community Development, Public Health Engineering Department and Punjab Education Department.
Farhana lauded the efforts of the chief minister for taking certain initiatives like roadmap to access the poorest of the poor across all districts of Punjab and shared some initiatives like saving newborn lives, Diarrhoea Prevention & Control Project etc. Khawaja Salman Rafique said the government could not implement innovations without involvement and active participation of development partners.
Later, Ms Farhana called on Secretary Planning & Development Department Waseem Ajmal Chaudhry with her delegation. Farhana thanked the Punjab government for
continued support on various projects.