President Alvi calls for adopting preventive approach to lower disease burden in Pakistan

KARACHI: President Arif Alvi has said that focus of medical professionals should be on prevention of diseases as it is very difficult for a resource-starved country like Pakistan to provide medical treatment to each and every patient.

“I believe that allocation for health must be increased but we are a resource-starved nation and I also believe that prevention is better than cure. As a dental professional, I know that 95 percent of dental ailments are preventable and we cannot provide quality medical treatment to each and every patient in such a large population, so we must focus on preventive approach along with curation”, President Alvi said while addressing the inaugural ceremony of 23 Annual International Conference of Pakistan Society of Rheumatology (PSR) here at a local hotel in Karachi.

Over two dozen international experts from several European Countries, Middle East and North America are attending the four-day annual international conference on Rheumatic disorders while a large of experts from different cities of Pakistan as well as students from medical varsities and colleges are also attending the medical moot.

President Alvi maintained that Lady Health Workers (LHWs) who go door to door in the country and mosques could play an important role in spreading the messages regarding prevention of diseases.

“Lady health workers can educate masses especially women on prevention while role of masses is very important in spreading the awareness regarding importance of cleanliness, which has been emphasized by the Islam”, he said and urged that now entire Pakistani society should be speaking about and focusing on prevention of diseases, which is the best approach for the countries like Pakistan.

Deploring that a large number of Pakistan medical professionals migrated abroad after acquiring very subsidized education in Pakistan and settled there but added that now Pakistan had become a matured country and ready to welcome its professionals back.

“Pakistan is a matured nation now and we want peace and live peacefully. Whole Pakistani nation thinks alike and we want prosperity. Pakistani people are most humanity loving people who provided refuge to 3.5 million afghan refugees when we could not even afford to host them, while 2.5 million of those refugees which their fourth generation are still living here”, he said and urged medical professionals to show humanity and compassion while dealing with their patients.

He maintained that present government was spending a significant amount of money on provision of medical services, giving health insurance to people while standard of medical education is also increasing in the country.