The Punjab Healthcare Commission (PHC) and Drug Advisory Programme (DAP) of the Colombo Plan will cooperate for an effective monitoring of the quality of care in the addiction treatment centres of the province. This was decided in a meeting held at PHC office between the commission’s management and DAP Colombo Plan Senior Adviser Muhammad Ayub on Friday. The PHC team was led by Clinical Governance & Organisational Standards Director Dr Mushtaq Ahmed Salariya. Licensing Director Dr Muhammad Anwar Janjua and others were also present on the occasion. Dr Mushtaq Salariya briefed the visiting delegation on the mandate and working of the PHC, especially on the ongoing campaign against substandard addiction treatment centres, which were failing to provide quality care and were reportedly abusing the helpless addicts under the garb of addiction treatment. He also mentioned that the PHC was an independent regulatory body constituted as per the PHC Act 2010 and working under the fully autonomous Board of Commissioners and an overall superintendence of the PHC vested with the BoC. While talking about the working and objectives of DAP, Muhammad Ayub said the programme was providing support to various preventive initiatives being undertaken towards drug demand reduction and provision of standardised addiction treatment and rehabilitation facilities in Pakistan and Afghanistan under the Colombo Plan. The visiting delegation highly appreciated PHC’s role and efforts in taking stock of the bad condition of the addiction treatment facilities. He informed that DAP was the only regional inter-governmental programme exclusively aiming to reduce drug demand in Asia and Pacific regions. He agreed to share the monitoring system and tools being used by DAP for quality assurance in drug addiction treatment and rehabilitation facilities. Both sides also resolved to frequently share the experiences and to coordinate with stakeholders regularly towards provision of quality services to the patients. Published in Daily Times, September 29th 2018.