KATHMANDU: Nepal’s embattled prime minister has saved a woman’s life after he diverted his helicopter to take her to hospital for emergency treatment, his office said.
Madhav Kumar Nepal was returning to the capital on Wednesday when he learned that a woman in the town of Rukum had suffered a heamorrhage during labour and needed medical attention, his adviser said. The prime minister ordered the pilot to divert the helicopter to pick up the woman, Kamala Chand, and take her to a maternity hospital in Kathmandu where she received life-saving treatment.
Local media praised the efforts of the prime minister, whose four-month-old coalition government is widely seen as weak because it does not include the Maoists – the biggest party in the parliament. The Republica daily said the woman’s family had given up hope of her surviving after she spent four days in labour. “The prime minister immediately postponed a cabinet meeting scheduled in Kathmandu and instead flew to Rukum on the army chopper,” said the paper.
Nepal has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world at 281 per 100,000 live births, mainly due to a lack of roads and medical facilities in rural areas. Nine out of 10 births in rural Nepal take place at home, but women are now offered financial incentives to deliver in a hospital as part of a campaign to improve maternal health. “Sadly, the woman’s child died, and doctors said she would have died too if she had not got to hospital when she did,” the prime minister’s adviser, Raghuji Pant, said. afp
http://dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2009\09\11\story_11-9-2009_pg20_8
i think the PM has set a gud example.