Bio-safety labs being set up in all teaching hospitals

LAHORE

On the directions of Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Bio-Safety Labs-2 (BSL-2) are being set up in all teaching hospitals and laboratories would also be upgraded. Tests of infectious diseases including Congo would be conducted in these laboratories. 

It was stated by the adviser to chief minister on Health Khawaja Salman Rafiq while chairing a meeting of professors of microbiology of the medical colleges/teaching hospitals at Civil Secretariat on Wednesday, according to a handout. The professors briefed the meeting about the requirements for establishing BSL-2 in their medical colleges, capacity of the existing laboratories and technical aspects of the laboratories. Kh Salman Rafiq said a comprehensive report of individual medical college/ teaching hospital would be prepared keeping in view the available resources and equipment. He said this would be analysed that how much work for setting up BSL-2 could be completed with the available resources and how much resources are further required for this purpose. He said he will request the CM for providing additional financial resources for this purpose.

Special Secretary Health Dr Sajid Chohan said a separate working paper of each teaching hospital should be prepared within a week in which financial analysis, existing resources, orientation, human resource requirement and other technical aspects of the project should be mentioned in the working paper. He said the working paper would be submitted to the department, the work on the project could be started. Kh Salman Rafiq revealed that World Health Organization would provide technical guidance for establishing BSL-2 in hospitals.

Special Secretary Specialized Healthcare & Medical Education Dr Sajid Chohan, Additional Secretary Technical Dr Salman Shahid, Chief Planning Officer Abdul Haq Bhatti, MS Mayo Hospital Dr Amjad Shehzad, Chief Bacteriologist Punjab (IPH) Prof Zarfishan Tahir, Consultant Dr Tahir Yaqub and professors of microbiology of the medical colleges attended the meeting.

PEF: The private schools attached with different free education programmes of the Punjab Education Foundation (PEF) should ensure to provide best educational amenities in their institutions. The classrooms should be neat & clean and airy, along with the facility of necessary furniture for the students. Similarly, congenial atmosphere should be arranged together with the provision of clean drinking water and hygienic toilets. The purpose is to make learning motivating for the students. Punjab Education Foundation Managing Director Tariq Mahmood said this while presiding over weekly coordination meeting at his office on Wednesday, according to a handout issued here. Deputy managing directors, programme directors and other officers attended the meeting. The meeting reviewed in detail the educational policies aimed to promote access to school education in the low income families.

PEF MD said that punitive action would be taken against the partner schools failing to abide by the policies; and added that clean environment involved the students in their studies. He asked the programme directors to constitute dedicated teams to regularly visit and inspect the partner schools every month. This will help in ensuring effective monitoring of school partners, he added. The meeting was told that PEF’s continuous professional development programme (CPDP) had conducted 328 training programmes for Teacher Development Programme (TDP) Level-one and trained 9,500 teachers of 1,944 partner schools of different districts.

Meanwhile, 328 training plans for Teacher Development Programme (TDP) Level-two will be conducted from 17th of October to 2nd of December.  Later, programme directors briefed the meeting about their respective programme performance and future goals.

BoD: The Punjab government has nominated Prof Dr Khalid Hameed Sheikh and Dr Abdul Rauf Shakoori as new members of Board of Directors of Punjab Education Foundation for a period of three years.

According to a handout issued here on Wednesday, the competent authority has also issued notification in this regard.