Nursing scholarship programme launched

Islamabad : Federal Minister for Education and Profession Training Shafqat Mahmood launched the nursing scholarship programme and said the ruling PTI had for the first time in the national history allocated 1,000 scholarship for nursing programme with disbursement of Rs 310 million for 2020.

He told the launching ceremony that the ministry would spend Rs 1.24 billion more on the initiative in the next four years.

"Equal opportunities for most deserving but talented students have been provided to all areas of Punjab, Sindh, Baluchistan, KPK, FATA, GB, ICT and AJK, so talented students who wants to pursue nursing as career but cannot afford to do so can benefit from this programme," he said.

The minister said the total intake as per approved seats allocated by PNC for year 2020 for nurses is approximately 5000, so by giving 1000 scholarships, 20% of students (every 1 out of five students) can avail scholarship.

"Usually nursing students belong to very poor families and are from very low income category group. They want to adopt this profession but as they cannot afford the fee they usually are forced to signed tough agreements with the affiliated hospitals who pay them very less and bond them for five to eight years. Year 2020 is being observed as Nursing year globally and this government has brought unique and exclusive steps to promote nursing in the country," he said.

The minister said there was a critical need for financial assistance of current working professional nurses to upgrade themselves by studying four years BSN degree programme since nursing diploma programmes was obsoleting from year 2020 and onward.

"Pakistan is far below the critical level for Human Resources for Health (HRH), being among the most HRH deprived countries of the world. Health system in Pakistan remains beset by a growing nursing workforce crisis," he said.