A tragic fire at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) in Islamabad has resulted in the deaths of 14 newborns. The incident occurred early Wednesday morning in the hospital’s critical care nursery, a facility intended to provide the highest level of protection for vulnerable infants.
Arif Rana, 46, was sleeping on the hospital grounds when he received a frantic call at 6:30 a.m. from his sister’s sister-in-law, who was inside the maternity unit. He was told a fire had broken out and was urged to reach the ward immediately. Accompanied by his 20-year-old son, Rana rushed to the third floor of the older hospital wing, navigating through pitch-black, smoke-filled corridors. He described the environment as suffocatingly hot and filled with the sounds of panic.
Rana managed to rescue his sister’s mother-in-law, while his sister and her newborn were saved by the quick actions of the sister-in-law. Rana noted that without her bravery, his family members likely would have suffered the same fate as the 14 infants who perished in the nearby nursery.
Hospital management attributed the disaster to a short circuit in the nursery’s air-conditioning unit. At the time of the fire, 15 newborns were inside the ward; only one survived. This incident follows a similar tragedy in June 2024 at Sahiwal Teaching Hospital in Punjab, where 11 infants died in a fire caused by faulty air conditioning, leading to the arrest of senior medical staff after investigations revealed expired fire safety equipment.
The emergency response timeline remains a subject of scrutiny. While the Islamabad district administration stated that emergency services were alerted at 6:45 a.m. and arrived within seven minutes, a Rescue 1122 official reported receiving the call at 6:55 a.m. and arriving by 7:06 a.m. Firefighters on the scene described the building as inaccessible, forcing them to break through concrete grills and windows to reach those trapped inside.
Families of the victims have expressed confusion and anger regarding the lack of information and the state of the facility. Kamran Riaz, whose three-day-old niece died in the fire, reported that his brother was told there was minimal staff presence during the emergency. Witnesses also alleged that the nursery’s emergency exits were blocked from the inside, and some noted that renovation work had been ongoing within the building, though the extent of this work remains unclear.
Other parents, including Samina Waqar and Sardar Atee Rehman, described harrowing escapes from the maternity unit. They reported that while security staff were present, they struggled to locate doctors or nurses as smoke filled the floor. While some relatives claimed staff fled the scene, the PIMS executive director, Rana Imran Sikandar, and Federal Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Tariq Fazal Chaudhry maintained that two doctors and four nurses were on duty in the intensive care unit when the fire started.
In response to the catastrophe, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has ordered a formal investigation and suspended the federal health secretary, Aslam Ghaury. Two separate inquiry committees—one from the Islamabad district administration and one from the Prime Minister’s office—have been established to determine the causes of the fire and identify any lapses in safety standards. The report also notes that “My sister gave birth to a baby girl on Tuesday, and she was admitted in the general ward of the hospital. The report also notes that “It was hot, and I could hear so much yelling and panicked shouts, and I couldn’t even see due to darkness,” Rana recalled, sitting outside the ward hours after the incident. The report also notes that “The smoke made it hard to breathe.”. The report also notes that accounts of exactly when rescuers reached the ward on Wednesday differ. The report also notes that with fire tenders and ambulances reaching the hospital within seven minutes, a statement from the Islamabad district administration put the first emergency call at 6:45am. The report also notes that fire and rescue service — said that separate stations logged fires at different times as calls were relayed, an official at the headquarters of Rescue 1122 — the government-run ambulance. The report also notes that his own station received word at 6:55am and reached the hospital less than 10 minutes later. The report also notes that which he later showed, was timestamped 7:06am, a video he recorded on arrival.
