The construction of the China-Pakistan Health Corridor and the cooperation between China and Pakistan in the field of health can directly benefit the people’s livelihood in Pakistan, Cheng Xizhong, visiting professor at Southwest University of Political Science and Law said on Friday.
“China-Pakistan Health Corridor is a very good concept. Initially, we were devoted to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Later, the economic corridor expanded to the cultural corridor and the tourism corridor. Now we are talking about the China-Pakistan Health Corridor,” he said in his article published by China Economic Net (CEN).
Prof Cheng, also a senior fellow of the Charhar Institute, believed that there would be other corridors in the days to come. “This shows that the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is constantly enriching and developing.”
He said the construction of the China-Pakistan Health Corridor and the cooperation between China and Pakistan in the field of health could directly benefit the people’s livelihood in Pakistan and added, “This shows that the construction of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is becoming more and more pragmatic.”
In his impression, China and Pakistan had cooperated in the field of health for many years. As far back as 2006, the health authorities of China and Pakistan signed a cooperation document in the field of health, which stated that the two sides would strengthen cooperation in the fields of clinical training, traditional medicine, public healthcare, prevention of viral diseases, and surveillance of infectious diseases.
This year, the novel coronavirus pneumonia was unprecedentedly spreading worldwide. For joint prevention, control and treatment, the central governments, local governments, medical institutions, enterprises and non-governmental organizations of China and Pakistan had carried out close cooperation, which fully reflected the special friendly relationship between the two countries.
In building the China-Pakistan Health Corridor, he advocated giving full play to two initiatives: one is the initiative of the governments; the other was the initiative of medical institutions. In addition to the efforts by the two governments, the medical institutions of China and Pakistan should carry out close cooperation.
Recently, he noticed a piece of information from the media that Chinese and Pakistani enterprises would jointly establish a medical laboratory. The incidence rate of cancer in Pakistan was very high, especially in lung cancer and liver cancer. However, due to the current medical and health conditions in Pakistan, patients could not get proper treatment.