LAHORE: Fear of coronavirus made the authorities abruptly prorogue the Punjab Assembly session on Friday as the opposition alleged that the government was failing to take preventive measures.

Proceedings of Friday’s sitting began more than two hours late than its scheduled time to take up written inquiries about the colonies department and discuss fare of the Orange Line Metro Train.

Before the session was prorogued by Panel of chairmen Mian Muhammad Shafi, PPP parliamentary leader Hasan Murtaza, on a point order, criticised the government for what he said gross neglect of health of citizens amid the threat of coronavirus which has taken over the entire world.

He claimed that the Service Hospital, Lahore refused to test one of his domestic servants for the suspected coronavirus saying they had no facility and also declined to prescribe any medicine with the advice that the suspected patient should go to some private laboratory for the testing.

The private laboratories, he said, were charging at least Rs10,000 for the test which a commoner could not pay.

Seeking intervention of Mian Shafi for realising the gravity of the situation, he said the entire world had taken intensive preventive measures to avert the coronavirus threat, including massive medical precautions, testing, quarantine and other steps but the Punjab government was still far away from equipping its public hospitals with the facilities to check, test and treat the patients.

Law Minister Raja Basharat challenged the PPP lawmaker and accused him of spreading misleading information not realising that “it’s not the time to create fear and panic among the masses”. He urged the MPAs to issue positive statements from this forum as the government was committed to countering the threat and had planned to set up testing centres at the tehsil level.

Counting the steps, he said the pilgrims coming from Iran were being kept in 14-day quarantine for screening of the virus.

PML-N MPA Awais Leghari wondered why the government had chosen his district, Dera Ghazi Khan, as the screening place for pilgrims from Iran without providing proper screening facilities there.

Information Minister Fayyazul Hassan Chohan told the House that 72 suspected cases of coronavirus were reported in Punjab and 71 were tested negative and sent home, while only one person was under observation.

He also asked Mr Murtaza to take caution while speaking on sensitive issues and refrain from creating panic among the people.

In view of the virus threat and pleas from the legislators, the government cut short the agenda of the ongoing session and the Chair put off the proceedings sine die.

Published in Dawn, March 14th, 2020