{"id":22263,"date":"2023-11-07T18:09:06","date_gmt":"2023-11-07T18:09:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/punjab-health-dept-orders-closure-of-schools-offices-in-smog-hit-areas-from-nov-9-12\/"},"modified":"2023-11-07T18:09:06","modified_gmt":"2023-11-07T18:09:06","slug":"punjab-health-dept-orders-closure-of-schools-offices-in-smog-hit-areas-from-nov-9-12","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/punjab-health-dept-orders-closure-of-schools-offices-in-smog-hit-areas-from-nov-9-12\/","title":{"rendered":"Punjab health dept orders closure of schools, offices in smog-hit areas from Nov 9-12"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The Punjab Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department on Tuesday ordered the closure of all public and private schools and offices in Lahore division and Gujranwala, Hafizabad and Narowal districts due to smog from November 9-12.<\/p>\n

The development comes a week after the Punjab caretaker government imposed<\/a> a \u2018smog emergency\u2019 in the province following the Lahore High Court\u2019s direction to take immediate measures to control hazardous air quality. The Provincial Disaster Management Authority had also declared smog a \u201ccalamity\u201d and banned the burning of crop residue.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Lahore on Tuesday recorded an Air Quality Index (AQI) of 447, according to the global air quality monitoring platform, iqair.com<\/a>. An AQI below 50 is considered safe for breathing.<\/p>\n

The notification issued by the provincial health department today said the spread of conjunctivitis was increasing day by day due to \u201cbacterial or viral infection, smoke, dust or chemical exposure\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cHence, it is mandatory to take all possible safety measures for prevention and control of this disease in the province of Punjab,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

The department ordered \u201crestricted movement\u201d in Lahore division \u2014 comprising Lahore, Nankana Sahib, Sheikhupura and Kasur \u2014 and Gujranwala, Hafizabad and Narowal districts.<\/p>\n

The department said that these areas had the \u201chighest air quality index\u201d and were potential hotspots for conjunctivitis due to smog.<\/p>\n

The department said that all markets, shopping malls, restaurants, cinemas, gymnasiums, schools (public and private) and offices (public and private) would remain closed in these areas from Nov 9-12.<\/p>\n

Further, there would be limited movement of people to and from these areas by public and private transport. However, certain exemptions were allowed, including for pharmacies, medical stores and petrol pumps.<\/p>\n

Earlier in the day, interim Punjab Chief Minister Mohsin Naqvi said that the provincial cabinet held a detailed meeting about the issue being faced by the citizenry due to smog.<\/p>\n

Naqvi said that Nov 9 had already been declared a public holiday in the country. He added that the provincial government would also notify a holiday for all schools and offices in smog-hit areas for Nov 10.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe health minister has briefed us about all the issues that are coming forward due to the smog,\u201d Naqvi said. \u201cThere is an increase in hospital patients. The elderly are having difficulty in breathing,\u201d he noted.<\/p>\n

He said it was impossible to end the prevailing situation but \u201cit can be controlled and reduced\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnother thing is that you must\u2019ve noticed that New Delhi has similar conditions as us and they\u2019ve shut down schools there as well,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019ve had to make difficult decisions as well and because of this we are also monitoring cities which have extreme smog outside Pakistan.\u201d<\/p>\n

CM Naqvi said the Punjab inspector general of police had taken responsibility for enforcing all the measures. \u201cThis is not permanent, it is a one-time thing,\u201d he assured. \u201cWe will try to improve things in these four days.\u201d<\/p>\n

Separately, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) issued a smog advisory.<\/p>\n

In a post on X (formerly Twitter), the NDMA said that smog was likely to reach \u201cdangerous levels\u201d in central and south Punjab, including Gujranwala, Multan, Lahore, Bahawalpur, Faisalabad.<\/p>\n

\u201cSargodha, Dera Ghazi Khan, and Sahiwal may also witness smog,\u201d the statement said, adding that Rawalpindi and Islamabad may also be affected.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Punjab Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department on Tuesday ordered the closure of all public and private schools and offices in Lahore division and Gujranwala, Hafizabad and Narowal districts due to smog from November 9-12. The development comes a week after the Punjab caretaker government imposed a \u2018smog emergency\u2019 in the province following the Lahore […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22264,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/_img\/social-default.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[192],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-islamabad-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22263"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22263\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}