Federal govt decides to return control of three Karachi hospitals to Sindh govt

Karachi: Faced with an acute shortage of financial resources and lack of fiscal space, federal government has decided "in principle" to handover administrative and financial control of three Karachi and one Lahore hospitals to the respective provincial governments, Ministry of National Health Services, Regulation and Control said on Saturday.

Federal Ministry of National Health Services, Regulation and Control had assumed the administrative control of three major Karachi hospitals that include National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases, Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre and National Institute of Child Health Karachi as well as Shaikh Zayed Medical Institute, Lahore in May this year on the directives from Supreme Court of Pakistan but no monetary allocation was made in the financial budget for three Sindh and one Lahore hospital.

Talking to The News on Saturday, Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Health Dr. Zafar Mirza said federal cabinet in it's last meeting discussed the issue of provincial hospitals in detail and decided to handover these facilities to the Sindh and Punjab governments.

"The federal cabinet and Prime Minister Imran Khan were of the view that in the present political situation, it would not be advisable to run these hospitals, especially Sindh's three hospitals by the federal authorities", Dr Zafar Mirza said.

He maintained that Federal Law Minister and the Attorney General of Pakistan would soon approach the Supreme Court of Pakistan and urge the Apex court to review it's decision regarding these four health facilities.

Ruling out any deal with Pakistan People's Party in this regard, the Federal Health Advisor maintained that this decision was taken in order to prevent people of Sindh from problems and difficulties.

To a query, he conceded that federal government was facing financial issues and it was difficult for them to run these huge health facilities in the prevailing economic situation but added that financial issues were not the only consideration while taking a decision regarding these facilities.

On the other hand, Sindh Advisor Information Barrister Murtaza Wahab welcomed the federal cabinet's decision and said they already knew that federal government lacked capacity to run such huge and specialized health facilities.

Advising federal government to refrain from interference in the provincial governments' affairs, he said federal government should concentrate on improving it's performance and fulfilling it's promises with the people of Pakistan.