Governor Sarwar inaugurates telemedicine centre at PU

LAHORE : Punjab Governor Chaudhry Muhammad Sarwar inaugurated a telemedicine centre at Punjab University Teaching Hospital here on Saturday.

PU Vice-Chancellor Prof Niaz Ahmad, Punjab Corona Response Team Member and PU Telemedicine Centre Focal Person Dr Zeeshan Danish, Chief Medical Officer Dr Muhammad Akram, Dr Tahseen Zameer and other doctors were present on the occasion.

Talking to the media, Chaudhry Muhammad Sarwar lauded Punjab University’s role in combating coronavirus. He also praised the PU VC and his team.

He said telemedicine centres set up by the Punjab government had received 10,000 calls so far and 1,500 doctors had offered their services voluntarily. He said there was one consultant on 10 doctors at telemedicine centres to guide people. He said, “We don’t want the persons suffering from cough, headache, temperature, etc, to visit hospitals so that if they were corona positive, they might not infect others and if they were not corona positive, they could not get infected from others.”

He said the step of opening telemedicine centres had been taken to control coronavirus spread.

The Punjab governor said people must not panic but they must adopt precautionary measures and stay at home. He said, “We must learn the lesson from China, Italy, the UK and other countries as the coronavirus had devastated the countries where people did not take it seriously. He said people must act as responsible citizens of the country and this was the most important way to cope with coronavirus. He also said the government was worried for the doctors, nurses, paramedical staff, Rescue 1122 staff, journalists, etc, who were working close to the corona patients. He said the government was also making efforts to provide ration to daily wagers.

Later, the governor was briefed about the telemedicine centre at PU Health Centre.

PU spokesperson Khuram Shahzad said people could call the helpline 1166 to seek medical guidance.