Majority Of MLO Posts Lie Vacant In Sindh Government Hospital

KARACHI, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 25th Jan, 2017 ) : Sindh Minister for Health, Dr Sikander Ali Mehendro here on Wednesday said vast majority of posts for medico- legal officers (MLOs) in different government hospital across the province are lying vacant.

Responding to the queries raised by the members of provincial assembly during its ongoing session, he attributed reluctance among the medical community itself to serve in the medico legal department as the cause for current situation.

The provincial health minister said there are supposed to be four women and six male MLOs in every tertiary care hospital, but doctors were not interested in the job. In reply to a question, he said non-availability of women MLOs has become a major problem leaving many of cases unattended as there exist reluctance among people in general to get their female family member undergo the process conducted by male doctor.

Dr Sikander said shortage of women MLOs has denied many of the deceased women, who may have passed away under mysterious condition or murdered, their right to justice closely linked to postmortem.

This is also affecting timely and crucial process of required examination needed by surviving victims, mentioned the minister. He said that absence of morgue in some of the major hospitals, even in a city like Karachi, may have also hampered the process of post mortem and autopsy.

Autopsy, Dr Sikander said was equally important to identify reasons for varied diseases and health conditions enabling policy makers to update relevant policies. Dr Sikander Mehendro on the occasion said there were 42 HIV screening centers in the province and that besides 3942 HIV positive case there are 69 confirmed cases of AIDS in Karachi only.