Federal Minister for National Health Services, Regulations and Coordination, Syed Mustafa Kamal, on Tuesday inaugurated the completion of Phase I of the upgradation of the Cardiac Centre at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) during a visit to the country’s premier public-sector tertiary care hospital.
On the occasion, he also inaugurated the Patient Facilitation Assistant Service in the PIMS Emergency Department to improve patient guidance and service delivery.
Addressing the inauguration ceremony, the federal health minister said that PIMS serves as the largest referral hospital for patients not only from Islamabad but also from Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Gilgit-Baltistan, large parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and other remote areas of the country.
He said PIMS receives approximately 7,000 to 9,000 patients every day and that, when attendants and family members are included, between 30,000 and 40,000 people benefit from the hospital daily. He remarked that this was equivalent to the size of a major public gathering every single day, reflecting both the immense trust people place in PIMS and the extraordinary burden on the institution.
The minister observed that the overwhelming patient load on Pakistan’s public teaching and tertiary-care hospitals was largely the result of the ineffective functioning of the country’s primary healthcare system. He noted that common ailments, such as colds, influenza, fever, minor pain, and routine antenatal check-ups, should ideally be managed at Basic Health Units (BHUs) and dispensaries. However, the lack of adequately functioning primary healthcare facilities forces patients to seek treatment at major hospitals such as PIMS, placing unnecessary pressure on specialized healthcare services.
Kamal informed the audience that the government was revitalizing 28 Basic Health Units in Islamabad to strengthen primary healthcare, reduce the burden on tertiary-care hospitals, and ensure that quality healthcare services were available closer to people’s homes.
Highlighting the newly upgraded Cardiac Centre, the minister said that a state-of-the-art facility, built at a cost of Rs. 7.2 billion, had been completed and made operational with an additional investment of Rs. 900 million. He noted that the centre houses Pakistan’s first advanced cardiac machine of its kind, through which patients suffering from heart disease would receive treatment free of charge.
The minister emphasized that, given Pakistan’s rapidly growing population, merely constructing more hospitals was not a sustainable solution. He stressed that an effective healthcare system could only be achieved through disease prevention, a robust primary healthcare network, greater public awareness of healthy lifestyles, appropriate birth spacing, and family planning. He said the government’s goal was to keep people healthy before they became patients.
Kamal further observed that while many preventable diseases had been significantly controlled around the world, thousands of Pakistanis continued to lose their lives to the same avoidable illnesses. He underscored that disease prevention, rather than treatment alone, must become the country’s foremost health priority.
The federal health minister stressed that preventing disease was not the responsibility of the Ministry of National Health Services alone but required a coordinated national effort. He pointed out that nearly 68 percent of diseases in Pakistan are linked to contaminated water, making the provision of safe drinking water, sanitation, sewerage systems, and waste management the responsibility of local governments.
He emphasized that without empowering local governments with adequate authority, financial resources, and effective administrative systems, quality governance and essential healthcare services could not reach communities at the grassroots level.
Concluding his address, Kamal said the true objective of decentralization was to ensure that public issues were resolved promptly at the Union Council level. He reaffirmed that a strong, efficient, and empowered local government system was indispensable for achieving lasting improvements in public health and ensuring equitable access to quality healthcare across Pakistan.
The federal health minister also said that he did not oppose the 18th Constitutional Amendment but had concerns over its incomplete implementation. He explained that while resources had been transferred from the federal government to the provinces, an effective mechanism for further transferring funds from the provinces to districts and local governments had not been established. He noted that approximately Rs. 8.848 trillion had been transferred to the four provinces during the last fiscal year, yet a strong local government structure to ensure the effective utilization of these resources at the grassroots level remained absent.
He said that once resources were transferred directly to neighborhoods and local governments, essential public services such as safe drinking water, sanitation, sewerage, and other basic civic facilities would improve significantly, leading to a substantial reduction in the burden of disease. He reiterated that the real solution to Pakistan’s health challenges lay not only in building hospitals but also in preventing disease through a strong and effective local government system.
The federal minister further observed that the absence of an effective local government system had also created challenges in building public awareness and trust regarding polio and other immunization programmes. He explained that locally elected councillors were residents of the communities they represented and were directly accountable to the people, making them more trusted voices. This, he said, enabled health programmes to be implemented more effectively at the community level and helped strengthen public confidence in vaccination initiatives.
Kamal also remarked that the current administrative system relied on only a few hundred bureaucrats to manage the country’s governance structure, whereas a robust local government system would significantly expand the reach of governance and public service delivery by engaging millions of people at the grassroots level. He emphasized that sustainable solutions to public issues depended on the effective devolution of authority, resources, and responsibilities to the lowest tiers of government.
Reaffirming the government’s commitment, the federal health minister said that the Ministry of National Health Services was utilizing all available resources to strengthen Pakistan’s healthcare system by making it more resilient, people-centred, and focused on preventive healthcare, ensuring that every citizen had timely, equitable, and quality access to healthcare services without discrimination.