Shehri TV – Pakistan News, Current Affairs, Entertainment

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi (Pakistan News & Features Services)  A study exploring the risk posed by high blood pressure in rural areas of Sindh has found alarmingly low awareness of the disease, and numerous cases of uncontrolled blood pressure despite the use of medication. High blood pressure, or hypertension, is often seen as a ‘lifestyle disease’ that is common in urban areas where risk factors such as stress, poor eating habits and a lack of exercise are common.  However, findings from a baseline survey conducted by Aga Khan University in 10 rural areas of Thatta, released on May 17, World Hypertension Day, point to the disease being a public health threat in rural areas as well.  One in three adults in Pakistan is already living with high blood pressure, according to statistics from the World Health Organization. The study noted a similar prevalence in rural areas with one in five adults over the age of 40 living with hypertension.  Re...

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi (Pakistan News & Features Services) The Mayor of Karachi, Wasim Akhtar, has declared the fire fighters as heroes, complimenting them for putting their own life in danger to save lives and property of other people. “The World Fire Fighters Day reminds us the sacrifices of fire fighters and great work which they did all over the world. The fire brigade of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) will be provided modern facilities and all necessary equipment and apparatus which are required to put off fire in any metropolitan city. The Sindh government as well as the federal government have been requested to provide funds for fire brigade so that this department could be made even more effective and better,” he remarked in his message on on the World Fire Fighter’s Day celebrated on May 4.  Mayor Wasim Akhtar stated that Karachi was a big city where many industrial zones as well as commercial centers with high rise buildings existed alo...

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi (Pakistan News & Features Services) The Mayor of Karachi, Wasim Akhtar, regretted that no attention was paid on the maintenance of city underpasses during the decade alleging that the Sindh Government was only doing development works on papers as none of the ministers or even MPA was seen on roads, unwilling to leave their air-conditioned rooms for the cause of a city not belonging to them.  “80 percent of our Rs 80-crore budget being spent on sewerage works and I will send the bill of sewerage works to the Sindh Government. We are doing development works on the ground and are among the people. We are third tier of government and I have full support of the elected city council.” He expressed these views while talking to media representatives on a visit to Nazimabad underpass on May 3 to review and inspect the road carpeting and other uplift works.  MNA Kanwar Naveed Jamil, MPA Mahfooz Yar Khan, Vice Chairman DMC Central ...

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi (Pakistan News & Features Services) A new typhoid conjugate vaccine is to be added to the National Expanded Programme for Immunization following new evidence about the threat posed by a strain of typhoid that is extremely difficult to treat with antibiotics. An outbreak of extensively-drug resistant (XDR) typhoid in Hyderabad has already affected many children. The research from Aga Khan University (AKU), presented at the National Immunization Technical Advisory Group meeting in Islamabad, shows that cases are now appearing in Karachi, rural areas on the outskirts of Sindh, as well as in Quetta and parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.  The results of an emergency vaccination campaign launched by the Sindh health department in the worst-affected talukas of Hyderabad in January 2018 were also presented. The data showed that the typhoid conjugate vaccine was safe with no adverse events being noted in 99.7 per cent of children who received doses....

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi (Pakistan News & Features Services) The Sindh government has approved a major upgrade to the curriculum for lady health supervisors (LHSs) in a move aimed at enhancing the quality of door-to-door preventive healthcare services delivered by lady health workers (LHWs).     The new curriculum, which incorporates the latest treatment guidelines for pneumonia and diarrhoea: two preventable diseases that caused over 670,000 deaths in the country in 2015, was unveiled during a meeting of provincial stakeholders and researchers involved in the Nigraan Plus study at Aga Khan University.   The new curriculum includes directives on how LHSs can effectively support and supervise the work of LHWs thereby empowering them to apply the latest knowledge and clinical skills to manage pneumonia and diarrhoea at early stages; when care is the most effective. “This revised LHS curriculum will now be used for training purposes and it is ...

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi (Pakistan News & Features Services) The misconceptions present in phrases such as those who can’t do, teach and you’re just a teacher are at the heart of Pakistan’s education problems, according to speakers at the Teachers Matter symposium organised by AKU’s Institute for Educational Development (IED). The symposium brought together 250 policy experts, principals, teacher educators and researchers who noted that the low status of the teaching profession is one of the major issues affecting the recruitment, development and retention of qualified teachers.  “Teachers are looked down upon even though their work lays the foundations for an educated, prosperous society. The country’s commitments under the sustainable development goals require education stakeholders to attain universal access to primary and secondary education by 2030. You cannot achieve education for all without having teachers for all,” Dr Sarfaroz Niyozov, Director, IED, re...

By Rashid Zia Qureshi (Pakistan News & Features Services) “The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) would sweep the general elections 2018 throughout the country as the PPP Chairman, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, has won the hearts of Punjab.” This was observed by the Speaker of the Sindh Assembly, Agha Siraj Durrani, while talking to media at the residence of elder of All Sindhi-Pathan Nawabshah community, Jan Muhammad Pathan. Durrani contradicted the allegations of horse trading leveled against the PPP, adding that other parties were attempting to pass the impression as if their hands were clean.  “That who fed whom and how much quantity of grass was given to the horses would be known soon but even if anyone have evidence of horse trading he or she should show it,” he said.  When asked Imran Khan if would contest from Karachi, Durrani said that it is Imran’s wish to contest general election from any part of the country but the factual position is that he would ba...