‘Sindh Health Department (SHD) plans on establishing 50 model dispensaries in different parts of Tharparkar district.’ This was shared by Sindh Health Minister Dr Azra Fazal Pechuho in a meeting with People Primary Health Initiative (PPHI) and district health officers (DHOs) on Monday. The health minister said that these proposed dispensaries would work round the clock in designated areas of district Tharparkar. Dr Pechuho further informed the meeting that most of the health centers would be made birthing stations and midwives would also be recruited for these stations. The minister further asked PPHI to hire female medical officers (MOs) in order to fulfill the shortage of human resources. She further said that routine immunisation remained a big issue and more vaccinators were needed to fill the gap. She directed PPHI to hire vaccinators to bridge gap for meeting challenges of the prevalent situation. The health minister further said that family planning should be a part of institutional deliveries and pregnant women should be encouraged to follow family planning. She said that it would be easier to work under private public partnership (PPP) mode because it was flexible/ Dr Azra Fazal said that improving infrastructure and recruiting human resources were crucial to the provision of health facilities to people. She agreed with the suggestion that certain cold chain storage facilities, working under DHOs should be given access to PPHI so they could perform well and procure vaccinations smoothly. She asked them to co-ordinate with each other. PPHI chief executive officer (CEO) Ghulam Ali Soomro, Sindh Health director general (DG) Dr Mubeen Ahmed, PPHI HR director Javed Abro and Zeb Daher also attended the meeting. Published in Daily Times, November 20th 2018.