Use of illegal, substandard stents will not be tolerated: CJP

ISLAMABAD: The use of illegal and substandard stents would not be tolerated, said Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar on Tuesday.

He was speaking at the Supreme Court during the hearing of the suo moto notice on substandard stents held by a three-member bench.

He said stents from China are instantly registered, while the process remains pending for those from America.

"The government departments should clean up their acts, because their irresponsible behaviour would not be tolerated," he said.  

At the hearing, Justice Umar Ata Bandial asked why registration requests for stents were pending.

Additional Attorney General Rana Waqar assured the court that the issue of registration of substandard stents would be taken by by the boards concerned.

The court also sought reply from the drug regulatory board over the registration of stents and the case was adjourned till the first week of March.

The stents are considered substandard as they are not registered and hence cannot be checked for quality.

The issue of patients being operated illegal stents has recently surfaced in the country.

Crackdowns from authorities concerned revealed the use of such stents at different hospitals.

A few days back, around 25 substandard stents were seized from a private and government hospitals during raids by drug control teams in Peshawar.

According to officials of the health department, the seized stents did not have manufacturing date, price or registration number on them.
Besides, the Federal Investigation Agency exposed a wicked mafia involved in selling fake stents to heart patients and fraudulently extracting money from them, officials said.

These fraudsters also included some doctors at Lahore's Mayo Hospital, who would falsely diagnose people with heart issues, letting their accomplices trick them into getting surgeries.

They would sell them fake stents for up to Rs200,000, which actually cost the fraudsters Rs6,000. The swindlers even conned several patients into paying money without even placing these stents inside their bodies.

The FIA exposed the mafia by sending its assistant director as a patient, said Deputy Director Sarfraz Chaudhry. Officials also recovered fake stents worth Rs40 million.

Sources within the FIA told Geo News that one of the three members of an inquiry committee, formed by the Punjab government to probe the matter, is himself associated with manufacturing of unregistered stents.