KARACHI – Jacobabad Institute of Medical Sciences (JIMS) would be made an institution of international standard with the coordination of USAID and all technical, medical and security staff will be hired from open market to make it a success. Sindh Minister for Health Jam Mehtab Hussain Dahar has said this while talking to Deputy Mission Director Graig G Buck in Sindh Assembly office on Friday. Secretary Health Dr Saeed Ahmed Mangnijo, Dr Dabeer Ahmed and Dr Zulfiqar also attended the meeting. He directed Health secretary to remove bureaucratic hurdles in order to get the objective and to resolve all administrative and financial issues at the earliest. All stakeholders should be taken on board to make JIMS functional because this institution will not only cater the needs of interior Sindh but it will also provide treatment facilities to the patients of Balochistan, he said. Later, he talked to journalists and told them that seven rural health centres, eight basic health centres and 202 dispensaries are working in Thar and in collaboration with HANDS, Thar Deep and other NGOs and 404 ambulances providing health facilities to the door steps in remote areas. Replying to a question, he said that 642 lady health workers and 103 midwives have been trained to make safe deliveries and to provide initial health care to the mothers and newly born children. He said that in the first phase, 165 midwives have been trained while in second phase through short training courses many hundreds educated girls would be given training in this regard. “We are focusing on controlling deaths of ailing mothers and their babies and ensuring maximum possible health care facilities for expectant mothers to avoid premature birth”, he concluded.