MSD to be abolished, districts to purchase medicines: Ehsan Shah
Health Desk :
QUETTA: Health minister Balochistan, Syed Ehsan Shah has said that the Medical Store Department (MSD) would be abolished and districts would be authorized to purchase medicines. “Our government has decided to decentralize powers”, Mr. Shah told Quetta Voice on Thursday.
Instead of MSD, now every hospital in Quetta and all district headquarters would purchase medicines, the minister mentioned. The health department has also established a medicine coordination committee (MCC) to fix and approve the list of medicines for government-run hospitals in Balochistan.
“We want to ensure transparency in terms of purchase of medicines”, Mr. Shah noted. He said Rs. 4bs budget would be decentralized to all 33 districts of Balochistan. The MCC would ensure the best quality, reasonable prices of medicines.
Decentralization of powers especially the purchasing power was one of the longstanding demands of the people. In the past stories of corruption in the MSD made headlines in the media. The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had also arrested and punished MSD officers involved in corruption cases.
