PAMI calls on PM, president to save dental colleges from destruction

Due to poor policies of PMC, five dental societies in Sindh were left vacant last year.

The Pakistan Association of Private Medical and Dental Institutions has demanded from the President of Pakistan Dr. Arif Alvi, Prime Minister Imran Khan and Advisor to the Prime Minister on Health Dr. Faisal Sultan that dental colleges be saved from destruction. If the catastrophic nature of private dental colleges is not taken notice of, billions will be lost and revenues will be diverted abroad which will adversely affect Pakistan’s economy. If the matter is not taken immediate notice, dental colleges across the country will be forced to close.

Association of Private Medical Institutions Central (PAMI) was held in which concern was expressed that President Pami Sindh had informed the authorities about the destruction of dental colleges in Sindh last year as well. The private dental colleges of Sindh had to suffer the consequences. The Sindh government had to make the MD CAT score 100% to save the dental colleges from destruction. Now the crisis in Punjab’s dental colleges has intensified.

Pami Pakistan has once again written a letter to the Prime Minister and the President on January 23 informing them of the whole situation. If notice is not taken again by the authorities then dental colleges in Punjab like Sindh will be destroyed. Expressing their concerns, the members at the meeting said that the graph of medical sector in Pakistan is declining day by day mainly due to the Pakistan Medical Commission (PMC) enacting new rules in the absence of all stakeholders. And they have to be implemented without practice while this attitude has been going on for the last few years and because of this attitude thousands of Pakistani students go abroad every year to pursue medical education which has cost billions of rupees. The remittance of revenue falls on Pakistan’s economy and countries like Kyrgyzstan are taking full advantage of it.

Expressing further concern at the meeting, the executive council members said that in the current situation, if only dental is concerned, then at present there are almost no admissions in private dental colleges across the country whereas last year also due to poor policies of PMC. 500 seats of dental colleges of Sindh province could not be filled. The main reason for this is that this year the admissions for medical and dental have been announced to be opened together and for both admissions the same merit of MDCAT has been kept whereas in the past earlier medical admissions were completed and this After that dental admissions were opened and similarly the merit of dental colleges has always been less than medical.

According to statistics, more than 40,000 fake dental practitioners across the country are playing with people’s lives. According to the World Health Organization, developing countries need one dentist for 75,000 people, while our country has one dentist for 130,000 people.