MEDICAL FIRST AID REFORMS VS MEDICO LEGAL LAW– DEATHS OF INJURED BY DELAYED MEDICAL AID IN PAKISTAN AND PROVISON OF ROADSIDE MEDICAL AID
By year 1996 doctors were not allowed to provide medical aid and or treatment to any injured person who was the victim of road accident and or any other kind of incident until the process of registering FIR in local police station in compliance of law governing medico legal procedure may be completed which was causing hundreds of thousands deaths of injured due to delayed medical first aid or treatment. Mr. Mansoor filed a writ petition in 1996; challenging such inhuman procedure before superior courts of Pakistan. He prayed that medico legal procedure and practice of delayed medical treatment may be declared unconstitutional and inhuman.
He further prayed that at site medical first aid (free ambulance service and paramedic service) should be provided by the government to injured persons at the accident scene and or at crime scene prior to registration of FIR. Further, he requested the honorable court that an order may be passed to provide first aid medical treatment to those injured persons who may manage to approach hospitals on their own or transported by any public member.
The court disposed of the writ petition in favor of petitioner and directed the government to provide road side medical assistance and immediate treatment to victims but the order was not implemented by the then government. Finally, the court ruling was complied with by Government of Punjab during tenure of Ex Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervez illahi where original idea of Mr Fayyaz Mansoor was shaped by setting up 1122 department. Mr. Mansoor’s vision and efforts for reforming medical aid system has proved successful in saving thousands of lives and created thousands of new jobs. The change in such inhuman practice also improved standard of morality and good governance in the country.