Growing Covid-19 cases: Govt urged to equip lone tertiary healthcare facility in Mansehra

MANSEHRA: The associations of doctors, paramedics and nursing staff on Saturday warned that the Covid-19 cases could increase if the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government didn’t address the core issues faced by the only tertiary health care hospital of the district. “The doctors, nurses and paramedical staff have been performing duties at the King Abdullah Teaching Hospital’s 70 beds’ quarantine ward despite lack of facilities. There is no central oxygen supply system, portable X-ray, ultra sounds and separate surgical equipment for Covid-19 patients, which could cause a spike in cases of this pandemic in the district,” Dr Salahuddin Shah, the president of young doctors association, told a news conference here.

Flanked by president of Nursing Association’s Nabeela Khan and representative of Paramedical Association Raja Zahoor, he said that despite repeated correspondence with deputy commissioner and high-ups of Health Department, they couldn’t avail highly important necessities to contain spread of Covid-19 at only tertiary health care facility of the King Abdullah Teaching Hospital. “Our district administration didn’t utilise even a single penny from Rs130 million provided by KP government to meet emergency and Rs100 million being kept at facility’s management bank account to meet emergency requirements of this hospital,” said Dr Salahuddin. He said that there was no central oxygen supply system and cylinders filled from Abbottabad were being used for both ordinary and Covid-19 patients, which might cause a further spread of Coronavirus as it is highly contagious disease. Speaking on the occasion, Nursing Association president Nabeela Khan said that the nursing staff, doctors and paramedical staff were performing daylong duties at 70 beds quarantine centre because of the shortage staff.

“The government appointed doctors to meet current emergency but even single nursing is not appointed resulting in they were performing daylong duties,” she said. Raja Zahoor, the representative of paramedical association, said that hospital was without incinerator unit and waste of Covid-19 patients couldn’t be disposed of properly, which was also causing spread of that pandemic rapidly.