ISLAMABAD : (Parliament Times)  Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Friday laid foundations of the country’s first nursing university in Islamabad.
The state-of-the-art King Hamad University of Nursing and Allied Medical Services is being established with the assistance of the brotherly country Bahrain.
Speaking on the occasion, the Prime Minister said the Government is committed to improving the quality of human resource in the nursing profession and to further enhance its prestige.
He expressed the confidence that the university will bring quality of nursing care in Pakistan at par with international standards.
The Prime Minister said health is one of the top priority of the Government. It has introduced major reforms and initiated projects focused on poorest of the poor.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif announced construction of fifty state-of-the-art hospitals in densely populated and marginalized areas throughout the country.
He said the goal of the Government is to provide integrated healthcare spanning over entire health spectrum from primary to tertiary care.
He said this programme is unprecedented in terms of its magnitude. He said the programme is being implemented in a phased manner and would provide coverage to 100 million people eventually. Work in this regard is being undertaken expeditiously.
The Prime Minister said besides healthcare, the Government is also focusing on preventive side. National immunization programme is providing free of cost vaccine facility to every Pakistani child and pregnant mother. There has been significant improvement in the coverage of the programme and concrete steps are being taken to arrest the spread of polio.
The Prime Minister described the proposed university as a significant leap forward in improving healthcare sector in the country as it would help fill an important gap in the healthcare field. He said there was dearth of properly qualified and trained nurses and the project would help overcome this problem.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif thanked people and Government of Bahrain and especially King Hamad for generosity in offering the support for establishment of this quality university.
He said the university symbolises strong bonds of brotherhood and friendship between the two countries. This is reflective of leadership of Bahrain’s love for the people of Pakistan and its commitment to help improve the quality of life of our people.