Alongside nursing, midwifery is set to be given state recognition as the cabinet yesterday approved in principle the Bangladesh Nursing and Midwifery Council Bill, 2014.
The council of ministers approved the draft bill with some amendments repealing the Bangladesh Nursing Council Ordinance, 1983. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina chaired the meeting at the Secretariat.
Under the proposed law, the Bangladesh Nursing and Midwifery Council will be formed headed by the health secretary while chiefs of departments and directorates concerned and people from different professionals will be included as its members.
Moreover, a seven-member executive committee will be formed. The health secretary will head the committee.
The council will recognise the certificates and degrees on both nursing and midwifery services.
The proposed law has mentioned names of some institutions which are currently giving certificates and degrees on nursing and midwifery while the interested new institutions would require approval of the council before awarding such certificates and degrees.
The government has been entrusted to formulate rules while the council to enact regulations.
Cabinet Secretary M Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan told reporters that the draft was given approval in line with a previous decision to transform ordinances, promulgated during the military regimes, into laws after drafting them into Bengali with necessary reviews and amendments and making them time befitting.
The cabinet was also apprised the participation of the Bangladesh delegation headed by the commerce minister at the eighth meeting of the South Asian Free Trade Area (Safta) Ministerial Council held in the Bhutanese capital Thimphu and the participation of Bangladesh delegation, headed by the state minister for science and technology, at the first meeting of the Joint Coordinating Committee for implementing the Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant held in Moscow.