DN Report KARACHI - United States Ambassador Richard Olson has inaugurated a new obstetrics and gynecology facility built at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Center (JPMC) at a cost of over $4.5 million. The construction charges and funds required for equipment for the facility were met by the US government. At the inauguration ceremony, Ambassador Olson said: "The United States is working with Pakistan to improve the lives of average Pakistanis through initiatives in the energy, economics, education and other sectors. We are also actively supporting the health sector and are committed to improving Pakistan's access to quality health care, particularly for young mothers and children under five years old. This facility delivers, on this commitment, by offering treatment for obstetric fistula, a debilitating condition resulting from childbirth complications. This condition afflicts many poor women in Sindh and Balochistan," he added. This US government-funded facility will provide 60 beds for surgery and treatment of fistula and other obstetrics and gynecological complications. It will also upgrade JPMC capacity as a first-rate centre for graduate and postgraduate medical education in Pakistan by providing a state-of-the-art training facility for more than 1,300 trainees, students, and officers. fferent parts of the country, Sindh has been badly affected, giving rise to suspicion that it was merely because of poor routine immunization coverage which is carried out by Sindh government under its Expanded Programme of Immunisation(EPI). On the one hand, paediatricians have been repeatedly calling for increasing the number of vaccination centres across the country and,on the other, doctors blame the frequent outbreaks of the disease to a drop in routine immunization. It is for this reason that door-to-door vaccination campaign was the only answer and, as such, it is obligatory upon the authorities concerned to launch the immunisation drive vigorously across the province so as to dispel the impression that the frequent outbreaks were the outcome of poor immunization coverage. The government is also required to take measures for providing safety to vaccinators as they reportedly more often face resistance while performing their duties particularly in upper Sindh. It is earnestly hoped that the authorities concerned in cooperation with elected representatives and elders of villages would leave no stone unturned in ensuring hundred per cent immunization coverage.
