LONDON: As COVID-19 strains Pakistan’s health system, tens of thousands of women doctors are sitting at home, their talents squandered in a country where millions have no access to medical care.
Many families encourage their daughters to study medicine not for a career, but to bolster their marriage prospects. The phenomenon even has a name — “doctor-brides”.
Appalled by the waste of expertise, entrepreneur Sara Saeed Khurram has set up a telemedicine platform enabling female medics to provide e-consultations from their homes to patients in rural communities.
“Half the population in Pakistan – 100 million people – never get to see a doctor in their lifetime,” Khurram, CEO of Sehat Kahani, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
“At the same time we have another big challenge which is very close to my heart — more than 60 percent of our doctors are women, but most don’t work.”
Sehat Kahani is among a myriad of social enterprises — businesses seeking to build a better world — that are innovating to plug health care gaps in developing countries, a task given added urgency by the COVID-19 crisis.
On Friday, G20 countries, health organizations and other experts will meet for an online summit to share lessons from the pandemic and brainstorm on how to bolster health systems.
Khurram, who has seen patient numbers increase ten-fold during the pandemic, believes her model could be replicated in other developing countries with doctor shortages.
Since launching in 2017, Sehat Kahani has established 35 rural telemedicine clinics across Pakistan where, for a small fee, a patient can see a nurse who will link them via the platform to a doctor.
The nurse is trained to carry out examinations guided by the doctor who may be sitting at home hundreds of miles away.
Patients with a smartphone can also contact a doctor directly via an app.
Khurram, herself a doctor, said the doctor-bride phenomenon, compounded by a brain-drain, meant only 90,000 of Pakistan’s 200,000 trained doctors were practicing in the country.
“A female doctor gets the best hand in marriage so everyone wants their daughter to become a doctor, but not everyone wants their daughter-in-law to work,” she said.
“Our platform opens up opportunities. Now they can suddenly create a whole virtual clinic in their home.”
DOUBLE MISSION
In neighboring India, where an escalating COVID crisis has left the health system on its knees, entrepreneur Kunaal Dudeja said the country needs about 30 million more health care professionals to support doctors and nurses.
In 2018, he co-founded Virohan Institute to train young people, many from lower income backgrounds, in dozens of paramedical roles from laboratory technicians to operating theater assistants.
“Our social mission is two-fold — to significantly improve the quality of health care in India, and to improve the lives of youth,” Dudeja said, adding that student numbers had more than doubled during the pandemic.
“We’re providing an aspirational career and helping them cross socio-economic barriers.”
After qualifying, a trainee can quadruple what they would earn in the sorts of jobs typically open to them, Dudeja said.
Most of Virohan’s 5,500 graduates are now working on the frontlines of the COVID crisis.
The start-up, which operates across five states, is looking to expand across the country and potentially to Sri Lanka.
RAPID RESPONSE
Across Asia, Africa and Latin America, many social enterprises are working at a grassroots level, using everything from rickshaws to drones to deliver medical supplies to poorer communities.
Yunus Social Business, which invests in Virohan and other social businesses tackling poverty, said the pandemic has underlined the crucial role such ventures can play in bridging health gaps.
CEO Saskia Bruysten said social enterprises were often better placed than the government to respond fast in a crisis because they already worked with the most vulnerable.
“They are just closer to where the need is biggest. They’re usually the ones that can come in first because they see the need directly,” she said.
“Often government is very far removed, a little bit in an ivory tower, and doesn’t necessarily have the infrastructure to reach that last person somewhere in a rural area.”
Bruysten described social enterprises as the “beautiful shining star” of a new type of capitalism, motivated by engendering social change rather than enriching shareholders.
Many have quickly adapted their operations during the COVID-19 crisis.
With the pandemic making travel harder, Uganda’s Kaaro Health, which runs solar-powered container clinics, is sending nurses to treat patients at home, and putting its technicians on motorbikes to collect medical samples and deliver prescriptions.
Kenyan business Solar Freeze, which has pioneered the use of solar-powered chest freezers to help farmers cut post-harvest waste, is repurposing its units to store COVID-19 vaccines and other medicines requiring cold temperatures.
It has supplied scores of freezers to rural clinics lacking electricity and to Kakuma Refugee Camp in northwest Kenya — home to 160,000 refugees from more than half a dozen countries.
Social enterprises are also collaborating with governments and businesses.
In Liberia, Last Mile Health has partnered with the government to vaccinate health workers including a network of rural community health workers created after the 2016 Ebola crisis who have been trained to spot COVID-19 symptoms.
VillageReach is using drones to speed up diagnosis of COVID-19 test samples and deliver protective medical equipment in Malawi and Democratic Republic of Congo, and will use them to fly vaccines to remote areas when immunizations get under way.
In Pakistan, Sehat Kahani’s Khurram said they had liaised with the federal government to provide free consultations to all patients during the first wave of COVID-19.
They also installed apps in hospital intensive care units treating COVID patients, allowing junior doctors to get immediate advice from critical care experts based elsewhere.
“In a pandemic, solutions like these can be crucial.” Khurram said. “This has already saved many lives.”
Drones to digital: Pakistan joins nations innovating to plug COVID health gaps
https://arab.news/zw3hs
Drones to digital: Pakistan joins nations innovating to plug COVID health gaps
- Sara Saeed Khurram has set up telemedicine platform to enable female medics to provide e-consultations to patients in Pakistani villages
- Across Asia, Africa and Latin America, social enterprises are using everything from rickshaws to drones to deliver medical supplies to the poor
200,000 Afghans left Pakistan since deportation drive renewed in April
- Pakistan has launched strict campaign to evict over 800,000 Afghans who have had their residence permits canceled
- In total, more than one million Afghans have left Pakistan since expulsion drive was first launched in November 2023
ISLAMABAD: More than 200,000 Afghans have left Pakistan since the government renewed a deportation drive in April, Islamabad’s interior ministry told AFP.
Pakistan has launched a strict campaign to evict more than 800,000 Afghans who have had their residence permits canceled, including some who were born in Pakistan or lived there for decades.
According to the ministry, more than 135,000 Afghans left Pakistan in April, while the number dropped to 67,000 in May and more than 3,000 were sent back in the first two days of June.
Millions of Afghans have poured into Pakistan over the past several decades, fleeing successive wars, as well hundreds of thousands who arrived after the return of the Taliban government in 2021.
A campaign to evict them began in 2023, prompting hundreds of thousands to cross the border in the span of a few days, fearing harassment or arrest.
In total, more than one million Afghans have left Pakistan.
The UN’s International Organization for Migration on Tuesday voiced concern over a surge in Afghan families being deported from Iran, recording 15,675 crossing in May, a more than two-fold increase from the previous month.
The influx across both borders threatens to strain Afghanistan’s already “fragile reception and reintegration systems,” IOM said in a statement.
Islamabad has labelled Afghans “terrorists and criminals,” but analysts say the expulsions are designed to pressure neighboring Afghanistan’s Taliban authorities to control militancy in the border regions.
Last year, Pakistan recorded the highest number of deaths from attacks in a decade.
Pakistan’s security forces are under enormous pressure along the border with Afghanistan, battling a growing insurgency by ethnic nationalists in Balochistan in the southwest, and the Pakistani Taliban and its affiliates in the northwest.
The government frequently accuses Afghan nationals of taking part in attacks and blames Kabul for allowing militants to take refuge on its soil, a charge Taliban leaders deny.
Some Pakistanis have grown weary of hosting a large Afghan population as security and economic woes deepen, and the deportation campaign has widespread support.
Pakistan is now threatening to lift the protection granted to the 1.3 million Afghans holding refugee cards issued by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees at the end of June.
Pakistan blockchain chief meets US counterpart amid digital assets adoption push
- Bilal Bin Saqib meets the director of Trump’s Council of Advisers for Digital Assets in Washington
- He says Pakistan is building a real framework for digital asset adoption and economic modernization
KARACHI: Pakistan’s top blockchain policymaker on Wednesday expressed the country’s ambition to become the Global South’s leader in digital assets during a meeting with his American counterpart at the White House in Washington.
Bilal Bin Saqib, Pakistan’s Minister of State for Crypto & Blockchain and CEO of the Pakistan Crypto Council, met with Robert ‘Bo’ Hines, Executive Director of the US President’s Council of Advisers for Digital Assets. The meeting marked a deepening of bilateral engagement on cryptocurrency strategy and blockchain integration between the two countries.
In March, the administration in Islamabad established the Pakistan Crypto Council to help guide national policy on blockchain, digital currencies and crypto-related investments. This was followed by the government’s announcement of a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve (SBR) at the Bitcoin 2025 Conference in Las Vegas, making Pakistan one of the first Asian countries to integrate Bitcoin into its sovereign asset strategy.
The government also plans to establish an autonomous regulatory body to oversee the country’s digital finance and crypto ecosystem.
“I envision Pakistan to be a leader in the Global South for digital assets,” Saqib said according to a statement circulated after the meeting. “From launching our Strategic Bitcoin Reserve to unlocking national infrastructure for crypto mining and AI data zones, Pakistan is building a real framework for digital asset adoption and economic modernization.”
During the meeting, both officials discussed aligning national strategies on decentralized technologies, fostering regulatory coherence and building innovation ecosystems to promote youth engagement and financial inclusion.
Bo Hines, appointed in January by President Donald Trump, heads US policy development on digital assets and works alongside Council Chair David Sacks to position the United States as a global leader in the sector.
Saqib also held a separate meeting with officials from the White House Counsel’s Office to discuss legal frameworks around blockchain governance.
Pakistan’s broader digital asset strategy includes allocating 2,000 megawatts of surplus power to support Bitcoin mining and AI-driven data zones, aiming to turn untapped energy into economic productivity, job creation and digital infrastructure growth.
As regulatory frameworks continue to evolve globally, Pakistan says it is taking proactive steps to integrate private sector innovation with state policy and international partnerships, positioning itself as a key player in the next phase of the global digital economy.
Pakistan army says 14 militants killed in counterterror operation in northwest
- Security forces killed the militants in an intelligence-based operation in North Waziristan district
- The prime minister applauds the security forces for their ‘professional excellence’ after the operation
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s security forces killed 14 militants this week in the country’s volatile northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, the military’s media wing said on Wednesday, as Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif pledged to completely eradicate militancy from the country.
The operation comes amid a noticeable uptick in militant attacks in Pakistan, particularly in the border regions near Afghanistan.
In recent weeks, Pakistani officials have increasingly blamed India for backing the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an outlawed umbrella group of militant factions responsible for a majority of attacks in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Islamabad refers to the TTP as Fitna Al-Khawarij, a term rooted in Islamic history that denotes an extremist sect that rebelled against legitimate authority and declared other Muslims as apostates. It also describes the group as an Indian proxy.
“On 2-3 June 2025, an intelligence-based operation was conducted by the security forces in general area Datta Khel, North Waziristan District, on reported presence of Khawarij belonging to Indian proxy, Fitna Al-Khawarij,” the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said in a statement.
“During the conduct of operation, own troops effectively engaged the Indian-sponsored Khawarij location, and after an intense exchange of fire, fourteen Indian-sponsored Khawarij were sent to hell,” it added.
The ISPR said “sanitization operations” were ongoing to clear the area of any remaining militants, reaffirming the military’s commitment to “wipe out the menace of Indian-sponsored terrorism from the country.”
Prime Minister Sharif also praised the security forces for their “professional excellence” in the North Waziristan operation, saying such efforts were critical to eliminating the threat posed by what he called enemies of humanity.
“We will crush the nefarious designs of these terrorists,” Sharif said in a statement issued by his office. “With the professional capability of our security forces, we will uproot the monster of terrorism once and for all.”
He said the government and the armed forces were fully committed to ensuring the complete elimination of militant violence from Pakistan.
Soaring prices put damper on Eid Al-Adha sales at Asia’s largest cattle market in Karachi
- Prices of small animals have risen by $72, big animals by as much as $251.80, market spokesman says
- Analysts say Pakistan’s increasing meat exports have constrained supply, driven cattle prices up this year
KARACHI: The Eid Al-Adha festival should be the busiest time of the year at Asia’s largest cattle market in Karachi’s Sohrab Goth area. But soaring prices have driven away many of the people who would usually buy cows and goats to sacrifice on the Muslim holiday.
One of Islam’s two main festivals, Eid Al-Adha marks the climax of the annual Hajj pilgrimage, when Muslims slaughter animals to commemorate the willingness of Prophet Ibrahim, or Abraham, to sacrifice his son on God’s command, often distributing meat to the poor.
But this year, people like Nasir Khan, 25, say higher prices mean they cannot afford to carry out the important ritual.
“I can’t afford it this time,” Khan told Arab News, saying he had opted out of a seven-member group he had been a part of for years, which pooled money to buy sacrificial animals as a collective activity.
This year, the price of an average-sized cow or bull at the Sohrab Goth market had risen by around 94 percent to Rs330,000 [$1,201], said Abdul Jabbar, another buyer who did not disclose his age or profession and had decided against buying once he discovered the steep prices.
On a hot afternoon earlier this month, Jabbar strolled through the Karachi market as hundreds of cattle sat idle under makeshift tents.
“The price trend is very high, almost double from last year,” he said.
“The animal we had bought at Rs 170,000 ($611.51) last year is now up for sale at as much as Rs330,000 ($1,187.05).”
“MEAT EXPORTS”
Inflation in Pakistan peaked as high as 38 percent in May 2023. In May 2025, it rose to 3.5 percent, following a significant drop to 0.3 percent in April. But while food and fuel prices have somewhat decreased, financial experts say the prices of sacrificial animals have gone up, mainly due to increasing meat exports.
In the fiscal year 2023-24, Pakistan’s meat exports reached a record $512 million, a 20 percent increase from the previous year. This growth was driven by a 24 percent increase in export volume, reaching 123,515 tones.
While the majority of Pakistan’s meat production is consumed domestically, the country has seen significant growth in exports, particularly to Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Indonesia, and China.
Increasing meat exports reduces the number of cattle available domestically and during Eid Al-Adha season, when demand is seasonal and peaks sharply, supply becomes constrained.
“Price hike is due to meat exports and inflation in previous years,” Ahsan Mehanti, chief executive officer at Arif Habib Commodities Limited, explained.
“We have seen that there is a major increase in the export of livestock in the past three years, around more than 50 percent.”
Zaki Abro, a spokesperson for the Sohrab Goth cattle market, attributed the surge in prices to the availability of fewer animals due to thousands being killed in recent floods.
In 2022, Pakistan experienced devastating floods that resulted in the loss of over 1.1 million livestock. This figure includes approximately 500,000 livestock in Balochistan, over 428,000 in Sindh, and over 205,100 in Punjab provinces.
“On average the prices of small animals have risen by as much as Rs20,000 [$71.94] while the big animals have gone pricier by Rs 70,000 [$251.80],” Abro said.
“MARKET IS DULL”
The effects of high prices were visible at the Karachi cattle market last week, with few buyers present despite it being spread over an area of around 1,200 acres and 175,000 cattle up for sale.
Livestock merchants Muhammad Ismail and Obaidullah confirmed a drop in the number of buyers.
“We have a lot of animals still unsold,” Ismail, 26, said. “This could be maybe because of inflation.”
The traders blamed the high rates they were charging on the higher rates they had to pay wholesalers and the cattle market’s administration. The cost of animal feed had also sky-rocketed, they said. Global supply chain disruptions, local market volatility, inflation, and currency devaluation have all contributed to this rise.
The cost of fodder had surged by nearly 50 percent, impacting cattle farming, merchants said.
“Our eight to nine months farming cost for each of these animals this year increased to Rs250,000 [$899.28] from Rs150,000 [$539.57] a year ago,” Ismail explained.
Trader Obaidullah said sellers also had to pay a fee of Rs30,000 [$107.91] per animal to the cattle market authorities.
“Last year the market performed well,” Ismail added.
“All of our animals had sold out. More than half of the market had emptied by this time last year. This year the market is dull.”
PM Sharif pledges to preserve peace in Pakistan’s restive northwestern province ‘at all costs’
- The prime minister addresses a jirga in Peshawar, praising the sacrifices of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s people in the fight against militancy
- He says a committee has been formed to address the province’s financial concerns, with its first meeting scheduled for August
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday vowed to preserve peace in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province “at all costs,” praising the sacrifices of its people and calling for unity against what he described as Indian-backed militant threats.
Sharif made the remarks during a visit to Peshawar, where he addressed a Grand Jirga of tribal elders alongside the country’s army chief and top federal ministers. The visit took place amid a resurgence in militant attacks in the region bordering Afghanistan and growing concern over cross-border threats.
“The sacrifices rendered by the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are indelibly inscribed in the annals of our national history,” the prime minister said during his address. “The entire nation salutes your courage, resolve and unwavering commitment.”
He urged tribal elders to stand firm against what he called the “Indian-sponsored Fitna-ul-Khawarij,” a term used by Pakistani authorities for Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militants who they believe are ideologically extremist and backed by foreign actors.
“Peace in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa shall be preserved at all costs,” he said. “The Pakistan Army, in unison with all security institutions and the valiant people of the province, stands firmly united against the Fitna-ul-Khawarij and its foreign abettors.”
Sharif also called for improved bilateral cooperation with Afghanistan and said Afghan soil must not be used by Indian proxies to carry out terrorist activities in Pakistan.
During the jirga, Sharif also addressed financial concerns raised by provincial authorities regarding development funding. He confirmed that a committee had already been formed to review the National Finance Commission (NFC) Award, a constitutional mechanism for the distribution of financial resources between the federal government and provinces.
“The chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had raised the matter of revisiting the NFC around six weeks ago in Islamabad,” Sharif said. “We immediately formed a committee and provincial nominees have been finalized. The first meeting will be held in August.”
Sharif also praised the youth of the province, calling them a vital national asset and encouraging them to contribute to peace and national cohesion.
