Pakistan suspends eight officials over hospital fire that killed 14 babies

Pakistan’s prime minister has ordered the suspension of eight officials and directed criminal proceedings against them after a fire killed 14 babies in the neonatal ward of a government-run hospital in the capital.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif issued the orders after an investigative committee presented its interim report on the fire at Islamabad’s Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), his office said in a statement on Saturday.

The blaze broke out shortly before 7am (02:00 GMT) on Wednesday in the Mother and Child Healthcare Centre, sparking inside the nursery before spreading rapidly through oxygen outlets fitted at each incubator.

The fire was confined to a third-floor nursery, but officials said it spread so quickly that staff were able to rescue only one baby from among the 15 being cared for there.

“The deaths of these innocent children are a heartbreaking tragedy that has left the entire nation grieving,” Sharif said in a statement, promising that those responsible would face “exemplary punishment”.

The eight suspended officials, named in a statement from the prime minister’s office, include the hospital’s executive director, two joint executive directors, the head of its neonatal department, two senior doctors, a security official, and the head of the Capital Development Authority’s emergency services.

Sharif also approved action against a company responsible for hospital security and its officials.

He has appointed the National Institutes of Health’s chief executive as PIMS’s acting director in the interim.