ChildLife Foundation saves 0.46m children

KARACHI: ChildLife Foundation had treated over 4,62,000 children for infectious gastroenteritis and colitis, Sepsis, and pneumonia in Sindh and Balochistan in 2021.

More than 15 per cent of these treated children were most critical (P-1 cases) at the ten pediatric Emergency Response centres (ER) of the ChildLife in Sindh and Balochistan.

It is to be noted that ChildLife had been working in partnership with the provincial governments of Sindh and Balochistan since 2011 to provide free-of-cost quality emergency care to the country’s at-risk children.

Also, every ER had a fully-stocked pharmacy that stayed open round-the-clock, and these pharmacies dispensed life-saving medicines to critical patients utterly free of cost.

Besides, ChildLife had provided over 60,000 consultations through its 44 Telemedicine Satellite Centers in the year 2021.

Dr Ahson Rabbani, Chief Executive, ChildLife Foundation, expressed that they were grateful to the respective governments for galvanizing the mission of the foundation.

“At ChildLife ERs, we follow the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended triaging system to identify the severity of illness in child patients. This means that when children are brought to the ER, they are assessed and placed into three categories – P1, P2, and P3 – with P-1 being the most critical. P1 patients are rushed to the resuscitation room. Urgent medical care is provided to them to save their lives,” said Dr Ahson.

Dr Irfan Habib, the medical director of ChildLife Foundation, stated that Pakistan had one of the highest under-5-year mortality rates globally, and children were still dying of preventable and treatable diseases.

“The figures are nothing short of tragic because 80 per cent of the children who die can be saved with timely medical attention,” said Dr Irfan.

It is pertinent to mention here that ChildLife has treated 4 million children since its inception in 2011 in line with its dedication to serving children from underprivileged backgrounds.

Stepping into 2022, ChildLife Foundation is set to replicate its successful emergency care model in Punjab. ChildLife’s ER in Mayo Hospital, Lahore, would soon begin providing care to children in Pakistan’s most populous province.