WEDNESDAY, MAY 15, 2024
A Pakistani teenager with a heart ailment got a new lease of life last week, after she received a heart donor from Delhi.
Nineteen-year-old Ayesha Rashan had been suffering from a heart disease for the past decade. In 2014, she visited India as a nine-year-old, where a heart pump was implanted to support her failing heart. Unfortunately, the device proved ineffective, and doctors recommended a heart transplant to save her life.
Ayesha Rashan’s family sought consultation at MGM Healthcare Hospital in Chennai.
The medical team advised that a heart transplant was necessary as Ayesha’s heart pump had developed a leak, and she was placed on an Extra Corporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO) procedure.
A heart transplant can cost over INR 35 lakh (PNR 1.17 crore). In Rashan’s case, this bill was covered by the doctors and the trust.
This is not the first time that Indian doctors saved the lives of Pakistani nationals suffering from a serious heart conditions.
Pakistani woman Arifa Bano (43) travelled across boundaries to Bengaluru in March last year to get treated for a complex heart condition, mitral regurgitation (leakage of the heart) for over 27 years. And in 2015, Karachi resident Faisal Abdullah Malik, had a successful heart transplant surgery in Chennai and the donor was an Indian.
Although India and Pakistan are neighbours and originate from the same womb of mother India, these two countries are the biggest adversaries too since the time these two countries were born free in 1947. The enmity is growing further with each passing day and more and more vicious arms are being produced to kill each other.
Relationships between the countries have two segments: Segment one - the government who runs the country with its policies; segment two - the citizens who live in that country. The interest of these two segments are divergent as the need and interest are different. While governance system goes by different perspective of their gain and loss, the common people have another perspective.
Since the beginning of the two-nation theory, the ongoing political conflict is unable to change the heart of Pakistan towards India in creating proper friendliness between the two most powerful countries of South Asia, where good friendly relations will do immense good.
With the above incidents it can be observed that we, perhaps, can change the heart of Pakistan by changing hearts of more number of Pakistani citizens.
The India–Pakistan border is one of the most militarised international boundaries in the world. There have been numerous attempts to improve the relationship, notably the Shimla summit, the Agra summit and the Lahore summit, as well as various peace and co-operation initiatives but none of these have really affected positively in improving the relation between these two countries.
Improved medical help by the Indian medical fraternity will definitely result in a greater medical tourist flow into India and provide patients in Pakistan greater access to quality healthcare.
This would require a strong understanding between the governments on the movement of patients and their escorts along with greater infrastructural facilities to include better hospitality, reliability, proper guidance, centralised information system, easy medical visa etc. This can be one of the long terms political agendas.
India can develop policies which make it easier for Pakistani patients to receive medical treatment in India, while contributing to the Indian economy beyond the health sector, for example the hospitality sector. It will be mutually beneficial for both countries.
So when we join the dots, we find that there is a huge opportunity in both the sparring neighbours to use successful heart transplants of Pakistanis to change the relationship with India which will let peace blossom between the two countries.
More patients from across the border will spread more goodwill in helping improving the relations. This is the time that all the beneficiaries of Indian medical care from Pakistan and those who are in need, must stand up and pressurise their government to stop fomenting trouble in India and mend the relations.
The free treatment given to Ayesha by the Chennai doctors shows that Indians don’t let hatred come in the way of saving lives, even if the beneficiary is from an enemy nation.
This can also be also be a good tool in the hands of Indian policy makers to create a good relations between the two countries. Saving lives is considered as an act of God, and this can easily help in transforming the entire outlook of the adversary if handled properly. Larger the beneficiaries in Pakistan, easier will it be for Indian Government to help establishing peace.
Let peace get a chance to prevail so that more hearts can beat and people get a chance to live. Human life is too precious to sacrifice it on the altar of hate.
Both the countries have already lost many in the battle field and will continue to do so. Can we stop this bloodshed?
