‘Hard time finding candidates’: NIH re-organisation to be completed by year end, says Prof Bhutta

KARACHI: Conceding challenges in finding ‘suitable candidates’ to run the seven constituent centers and institutes of National Institute of Health (NIH), Islamabad, officials on Thursday expressed the hope that establishment of four of the seven institutes in the NIH would be notified within a few months and start functioning under the executive directors to be appointed for them following a comprehensive recruitment process.

“We faced a hard time finding suitable candidates for heading different centers and institutes of newly-established National Institute of Health but we are hopeful that recruitment would be completed within a few months and four of the seven institutes would start functioning by the mid-year. We are also hopeful that all the seven institutes would be made functional by the end of this year,” Prof. Zulfiqar Bhutta, Chairman Board of Governors for the NIH told The News.

With the objective to replace the National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) with an institution to deal in future with health emergencies in Pakistan, President Arif Alvi had promulgated National Institute of Health (Re-organization) Ordinance, 2020 over a year back and the health authorities constituted a 7-member BoG to find health experts to run seven institutes and centers of the NIH including Center for Disease Control (CDC).

In addition to Prof. Zulfiqar Bhutta, the Board of Governors comprises Dr. Kashef Ejaz from United States, Prof. Dr. Qasim Aziz from UK, Adeel Butt from Qatar, Dr. Saba Jamal from Indus Hospital Karachi, Dr. Muhammad Usman Rashid from Shaukat Khanam Memorial Hospital Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Center and Dr. Muhammad Asim Baig from Pakistan Kidney and Liver Institute (PKLI) Lahore. They have been appointed for three years and entrusted to recruit competent and qualified executive directors for the NIH.

Prof. Bhutta claimed that the Board of Governors’, whose members are serving voluntarily and taking out time from their busy schedule, have so far met 26 times including two face to face meetings and working day and night to complete the reorganization of NIH, which used to be a premier health institute of Pakistan in the past but got destroyed due to inefficiency, incompetence and politics in the last 20-25 years. “We have searched entire world for experts of Pakistan origin to come and serve at these institutes and centers but owing to a variety of reasons, we have faced difficulties.

The person finalized as CFO refused to join at the last moment while a female director for the lab division also declined the offer,” he said and added they were trying to recruit young and dynamic experts.

He maintained that they were trying to re-build NIH from the scratch as it is supposed to produce vaccines and biological products for Pakistan, generate local research and data and work for the prevention of communicable as well as Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) among performing many other functions. “But I want to assure that five centers and two institutes will be up by the end of the year Insha’Allah in stages. The Institute of Nutrition and Health is the one that we are trying to also fast track”, he added.