Govt Approves Bill to Establish Health Regulatory Authority

Islamabad – The federal government has finally approved the bill for establishing the first Health Regulatory Authority (HRA) to regulate the health departments and programs being run by ministry of National Health Services (NHS), said an official on Friday.
According to the official, after the 18th amendment and devolution of health sector to the provinces, the federal city has been lacking a regulatory body in the health sector.
“There was nobody to control the health departments in the jurisdiction of federal city,” said the official. The official said that after the approval of the bill from the president, all the health facilities in public and private sector will be restricted to registered with the health authority.
Official said that all the hospitals, medical laboratories, health clinics, dispensaries, homeopathy clinics, teaching hospitals, surgery centers, nursing homes, dental centers, private X-Ray labs, psychiatric centers, nursing homes, burn center, community centers, dialyses centers, rehabilitation centers, slimming clinics, hair transplant centers and other will be registered with the authority.
The official said that the establishing of the authority will help in eliminating the quackery business in the city providing health rights to the citizens.
The official said that for composition of the board of the HRA, the federal government will advertise the positions.
The board will be comprised of nine members in total out of which 7 will be nominated on the recommendations of the committee formed under the HRA act.
The official said that rest of the two members will be nominated by the federal government.  According to the official the election committee of the board will be comprised of two members of federal government, chief commissioner ICT, representatives of private health sector, a representative of public health sector, member of homeopathy council, Medical and Dental Council, Nursing council, a member from civil society and representative of patients association.
The official said that each member of the HRA board and election committee will be nominated for three years while the board chairman will be elected for three years. The board will also appoint its chief executive.
The HRA will also establish its registration board which will be comprised of Director General (DG) Health, a principal of medical college nominated by federal government, a member of private health sector, and district administration representative.
The district administration official will be the secretary of the registration board.
The chairperson of the registration board will be elected for five years from its members.
Federal Minister for NHS Saira Afzal Tarar in a statement said that the purpose of establishing the HRA was to improve the health facilities standards in the city.
She said that a regular monitoring system will be installed in all the departments providing healthcare and steps taken will help in ending the quackery business.
Minister also said that senate has approved the up-gradation of Health Services Academy (HAS) to university level, which is already issuing PhD and MSPH degrees.
 
Source: https://nation.com.pk/19-May-2018/govt-approves-bill-to-establish-health-regulatory-authority