Incubators being used for food storage

Incubators in the Layyah District Hospital are being used as storage units for the past 18 years.


Express January 15, 2011

LAYYAH: Incubators in the Layyah District Hospital are being used as storage units for food and medical equipment for the past 18 years.

The Punjab Health Department issued a shipment of eleven incubators for the children’s ward of the hospital nearly 18 years ago at an initial cost of Rs9,500,000. “The machines haven’t been used. Initially they were operational for nearly a year but ever since they have been used for storage,” said a nurse at the hospital, adding that many of the staff didn’t even know what the machines were used for. Layyah District Hospital medical superintendent (MS) Dr Sadiq Surhani said that machines had been supplied before he had taken charge of the hospital. “I sent them to the children’s ward even though they were being used in the general ward before,” he said. Hospital officials told reporters that the reason the incubators were still not operational was because the internal parts had been extracted and sold in the market by staff members. “There is no check on the equipment and over the years all of the incubators have been rendered out of order,” the nurse said. Layyah citizens have appealed to the Punjab health secretary to issue directions to repair the machines and to launch an inquiry into the misuse of the equipment by previous hospital operatives.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 15th, 2011.

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