Medical centres under scrutiny after deaths

Lahore : Medical negligence has for several weeks been a key talking point in Lahore. From billboards put up in the city, the face of a 3-year-old girl looks down on passers-by. The slogan below the photograph says: "I was killed by doctors at Doctor's Hospital."

Doctor's Hospital, a five-star facility, is a key target of the campaign initiated by the father of Imanae Malek, the small child who died after she was given an anaesthetic injection in what a Punjab government report said was an at of criminal incompetence. She had been admitted for a minor burn. A murder case has been registered against the attending doctor.

The story of Imanae, who died three weeks ago, unfolded shortly after the tragic demise of Huma Akram, the wife of cricket hero Wasim Akram. The cricketer has blamed the incompetence of the doctors for his wife's death and vowed to "fight for the right to proper medical treatment." While a National Assembly standing committee has backed Akram's claims of misdiagnosis and inept handling, a leading Lahore doctor involved in his wife's treatment has served him a legal notice for defaming him and other physicians. He has denied incompetence by doctors and accused Akram of whipping up a media frenzy.

Opening Pandora's box

But the two high-profile cases have created something of a tsunami. Many others have come forward to complain about the care at private medical set-ups. "My sister lost her baby at one such centre, because it was not detected that she suffered from Hepatitis E," said Uzma Khan. The infection is especially dangerous for expecting women.

Similar stories have been appearing regularly in newspapers and on TV.