WHO Pakistan applauds health reform progress in Punjab

Credit: WHO Pakistan/A. Zaidi22 March 2018 – At the health stocktake meeting that took place today in Lahore, Dr Jamshaid Ahmed, Head of the WHO Provincial Office in Punjab, expressed his appreciation for the remarkable progress made towards implementation of the Punjab Health Reforms Roadmap. “The journey of the Health Reforms Roadmap under the leadership of Mian Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif, Chief Minister of Punjab, has revolutionized the health sector in Punjab,” he said.

Japan to provide substantial support to Regional Polio Laboratory

Islamabad, 2 March 2018 – The Government of Japan has announced today that they will be providing US$ 3.2 million for the procurement of equipment for the Regional Reference Laboratory for polio eradication, located in the National Institute of Health in Islamabad.

With the procurement of state-of-the-art molecular-biology equipment including genetic analysers, real time polymerase chain reaction machines, incubators and freezers, among others, the laboratory will significantly enhance its sample processing capacity. Through this new equipment, the Regional Reference Laboratory will improve the speed of the results reported from the stool samples that it receives of people suffering from acute flaccid paralysis, in addition to samples taken from the sewage in areas identified as being at risk of polio. In 2017 alone, the Regional Reference Laboratory tested 30 000 stool samples and 950 environmental samples coming from both Pakistan and Afghanistan.