By Muhammad Luqman
The Pakistan Engineering Council (PEC) , a regulator of engineering services, has allowed the testing of domestically produced ventilators to help provide better treatment to the COVID 19 patients.
According to a notification issued by the council, a special team has been formed by the Ministry of National Health Services to evaluate the testing procedure.
Pakistan currently possesses a limited number of ventilators and has been importing them amid the coronavirus epidemic. These locally manufactured ventilators are expected to bring relief for the government and the health sector as they will be cheaper than the imported ones.
According to the council, the testing procedures of these machines will be evaluated every six months if required.
“The whole process is being fast-tracked to meet the emergency requirement of the COVID-19 pandemic,” the document added.
Pakistan presently possesses around 3000 ventilators. Of these , about one third are out of order.
Pakistan Association of Auto Parts Manufacturers (PAAPAM) , the umbrella body of autoparts fabricators, has expressed hoped that the design of the state-of-art ventilators would be submitted to the given final touches and presented to the PEC and Engineering Development Board ( EDB) by April 14, Tuesday.
“We have conducted reverse engineering of a US-made ventilator. That has been in use at the major hospitals of north America and Europe over the last 15 years,” Engineer Razzaq Gohar, the head of the group working on the development of ventilator said.
Federal Minister for Science and Technology, Fawad Chauary has appreciated Pakistan’s engineers community for designing the ventilators domestically.
Talking to a private news channel, Samaa TV, the minister said that Pakistan Engineering Council had received 48 design of ventilators.
Three of these designs have been forwarded to Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) for approval.
The trial of indigenously made ventilators would be conducted in public sector hospitals, Fawad Chaudhary said.
“I am so proud of the initiatives of Pakistani engineers, technicians and scientists, who are going to make this task successful within a week,“ he said.
