Asia’s biggest children eye hospital is scheduled to be functional by January 2021 with a capacity of treating one hundred and fifty thousand children annually, a leading eye trust announced on Monday.
First children eye hospital in Pakistan
The project, being built at the premises of Al-Shifa Trust Eye Hospital Rawalpindi is near completion and is worth Rs. 1 billion. President Al-Shifa Trust Maj. Gen. (Retd) Rehmat Khan said, it will have a capacity to cater to the needs of 500 OPD patients per day.
Talking to the media, he said that our data regarding school screening shows that 20 per cent of children bear some sort of eye problems while 5 per cent of them have severe eye disorders.
He said that the trust is constructing the first children eye hospital in the country with a capacity of 500 OPDs and fifty complicated surgeries would be performed in a day.
This will be the biggest hospital in Asia as far as the capacity is concerned for which we are thankful to the philanthropists and the donors, he added.
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Earlier, in 2018, the then Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi had lauded the project of Al-Shifa Trust Eye Hospital on its 27th annual day celebrations. Former PM Shahid Khaqan Abbasi announced Rs. 200 million grant for the hospital.
President Mamnoon lays foundation of #Pakistan's first children’s eye hospital https://t.co/OvOUf1Ub1p pic.twitter.com/eFSMluB3bv
— Dawn.com (@dawn_com) April 7, 2016
Reportedly, the hospital was earlier scheduled to be operational in 2019. Shahid Khaqan Abbasi had said that he had been associated with the hospital in one way or another and intended to remain linked with it in the future as well. He said the hospital has become a flagship institution for the prevention and control of blindness. He said similar hospitals need to be built in other parts of the country as well.
“I believe that the planned children eye hospital – to be opened in August 2019 – will go a long way in providing state-of-the-art facilities to the parents for treatment of their children who are suffering from various eye diseases.”
He lauded the contribution of local and foreign donors including OGDCL and PPL. He also praised the doctors and staff of Al-Shifa Trust Eye Hospital.