KARACHI: Sindh Local Government Minister Syed Nasir Hussain Shah on Sunday inaugurated the 12th Chest Pain Unit (CPU) of National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases (NICVD) beneath Manzil Pump flyover near Quaidabad area.
The minister advised other provincial governments in the country to follow the footsteps of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) in serving the society without any discrimination.
“NICVD is a flagship program of Pakistan People’s Party and its 14 Chest Pain Units and 10 Satellite Centers are not only serving heart patients from entire Pakistan but patients from other provinces are also coming to Karachi and Sindh to avail quality cardiac treatment, which is being offered free of charge”, Syed Nasir Hussain Shah said while speaking at the inauguration.
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The local bodies minister cut the ribbon to inaugurate the NICVD’s Chest Pain Unit at Manzil pump along with PPP MNA from the area Syed Agha Rafiullah and Minister for Katchi Abadi Murtaza Baloch,
He said NICVD was not only a cardiac care facility but had also evolved into a ‘revolutionary health program” under the leadership of Prof Nadeem Qamar, who has converted a single hospital into a chain of 24 health facilities within a few years.
“The container inaugurated today is a complete cardiac care facility, and such containers have saved thousands of lives of in a short span of time in Karachi. People from other countries of world are closely monitoring this program and trying to replicate in in their congested cities,” he claimed.
The local government minister said the Sindh government was launching development projects in the province, claiming the provincial government would inaugurate 171 new projects in Karachi alone by June 2020.
He advised other provincial governments to learn from the experience of NICVD and replicate the projects of Sindh government in the area of health particularly the Chest Pain Unit Program of NICVD.
Executive Director NICVD Prof Nadeem Qamar said that they were establishing Chest Pain Units in different areas of Karachi every second week on the requests from people and their representatives from various city localities. He added that the CPU program of the NICVD had emerged as the most successful program in the cardiac care area in the world.
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“These 14 containers on the roads have saved over 7200 lives during last one and half years and at the moment while I’m talking to you, several patients are being examined and given first aid at this CPU,” Qamar said, adding that in cities like Karachi, the units were doing a great service to the people having chest pain and heart attacks.
NICVD officials have established 14 Chest Pain Units in Karachi during last two years, of which Lyari’s CPU was converted into a Satellite Center with facilities of angiography and angioplasty, while one at the Gulbai Flyover was gutted due to fire when an oil tanker exploded near the cardiac unit a few months back. At the 12 CPUs in Karachi and two in other parts of Sindh are functioning round the clock.
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