ISLAMABAD: Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on National Health Services Dr Zafar Mirza on Tuesday confirmed plans to introduce new legislation for nursing sector to improve professional standards and address workforce shortage in the country.
In a media briefing, Dr Mirza said that the government has decided to start nurses’ development programme to address the issues of shortage of nursing staff in hospitals and improving the quality of education and training at their institutions.
He said that there was also a plan to introduce public health emergency concept under which nurses would be assigned to perform duties at different level of health system during any emergency.
He added that this concept would boost the existing health system to make it prepare to manage any emergency situation.
Dr Mirza said that there was also a plan to start one-year public health course at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences for nurses, adding that initially 25 nurses would be selected for this programme and they would be deployed at primary and secondary health care system of Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT).
He said that in order to improve healthcare delivery system related to nurses, the government would upgrade nursing institutions for imparting education up to graduation level.
He added that with the support of Pakistan Nursing Council, the government was committed to improve the standard of nursing sector.
The special assistant said that there was a shortage of nurses in the country as against the requirement of 1.3 million nurses in Pakistan. only 100,000 nurses had been working, adding the government was considering various options to overcome this deficit.
He said that there was no culture of utilising the services of nurses at community or rural health centre level, however, but the incumbent government has been working on a plan to utilise their services at community level.
Dr Mirza said that an amount of Rs50 billion had been allocated for making improvements in health system and the prime minister had given a task to the Ministry of National Health Services to make strategies for effective future health system.
He said that the COVID-19 outbreak had exposed the health systems of various localities. He added that this disaster at the same time provides an opportunity to make changes in respective health systems for safety of people.
He said that the government had also decided to make reforms in health sector with making improvements in healthcare delivery system from primary level with an active role of all health professionals including nursing staff.
