HYDERABAD, April 12 The Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences Vice-Chancellor Prof Noshad Ahmed Shaikh has stressed the need for construction of more trauma centres on main roads and in disaster-prone areas.

Speaking at a seminar on “Save Lives; Make Hospitals Safe in Emergencies” organised by the Faculty of Community Medicine and Public Health Sciences to mark the World Health Day, he said that emergency- care facilities were not up to the mark.

He said that when he was health secretary, a trauma centre in Liaquat University hospital had been approved but it had not been constructed even after a lapse of several years.

Likewise, projects for trauma centres had been sanctioned for civil hospital Karachi and DOW Health University as far back as 2001 but they, too, had not been constructed so far, he said.

He urged the government to ensure construction of these centres as soon as possible and said without fully equipped trauma centre, it was very difficult to save lives in the event of natural disasters such as earthquakes, cyclones, floods, bomb blasts and suicide attacks.

He called upon media to focus on this issue in larger interest of public and told the students that LUMHS had been upgraded and its infrastructure, roads, libraries had been improved according to international standard.

He urged lady doctors and girl students who numbered more than boys in the university to learn more about emergency management of patients and develop emergency skills during their studies because they would not be able to get such experience after graduation.

He said that this year, the university hospital would be organising emergency training courses for students and doctors as well as for undergraduates and postgraduates.

Prof Rafique Ahmed Soomro, dean of the Faculty of Community and Public Health Sciences, read the message of WHO director general Dr Chan in which he had said that hospitals were the lifeline in emergencies.

Dr Soomro said that in 2008, more than 321 disasters had taken place around the world in which 235,816 people had been killed and millions had been affected.

In Pakistan during 2005 earthquake in the northern areas, 49 per cent health facilities were damaged, Dr Soomro informed.

Dr Ghulam Mustafa Abbasi, Dr Hussain Bux Kolachi and a number of other speakers also addressed the seminar, which was attended by a large number of students, teachers, nurses, doctors and general public.