Lured by advertisements from unqualified medics posing as doctors, some men in Pakistan visit unregistered clinics to boost their sex lives. Why don't they seek treatment from licensed medical professionals?
00:00This doctor has never received a formal medication.
00:28This doctor never received a formal medical education.
00:32He told DW that he learned how to treat patients by observing his father, who has a license to operate.
00:40Unregistered clinics like this one can be found everywhere in Pakistan.
00:47Government reports estimate more than 600,000 self-proclaimed doctors or quacks are operating across the country.
00:57Around a third of these quack doctors practice in Sindh province, home to Pakistan's largest city, Karachi.
01:06I was walking around the stairs and saw that he was a man with a man with a man with a man with a man with a man with a man with a man with a man with a man.
01:25My husband failed my husband, so he told me that I will not use this medicine again, and I will treat a better doctor with a doctor.
01:48After realizing the quacks medicines were harmful to his health, Khan's family and friends convinced him to go to the hospital to get help from a qualified licensed doctor.
02:18We start to go to the quacks, because they are easily available.
02:22In every place there is an advertisement.
02:24If we look at the advertisement, we feel that every person is poor.
02:28Every wall is written that we have a lack of health and health.
02:31There is a lack of education, a lack of easy accessibility to them.
02:36So, what happens is that the quacks, the word that they use, they feel that every person understands that there is a problem.
02:45So, they use the cash word that people like to go to the hospital.
02:50They don't like to go to the hospital, they go there.
02:53There has been a crackdown on fake doctors across Pakistan.
03:01Over 10,000 illegal clinics have been closed in the Sindh province since 2018.
03:08But enforcement is lax.
03:12At this clinic in Karachi, for example, the self-proclaimed doctor told DW that he bribes the police so they turn a blind eye to his unlicensed and unregulated practice.
03:27Authorities told DW that keeping these clinics shut is a challenge.
03:32There are parallel mafias who allow these quacks to thrive.
03:36And in our limited resources of the Sindharki Commission, when we go and do our activity,
03:42our mandate is only one.
03:44And that mandate is to seal the quackery outlet.
03:48But our mandate or our task is not to maintain the seal.
03:52The seal has to be maintained by the law enforcement agencies.
03:56So if I close 10 quackery outlets in Karachi, say today, tomorrow 8 will reopen.
04:05But that's not our domain.
04:07He says the current anti-quackery law needs to be revised.
04:12That includes tougher punishments for self-proclaimed doctors.
04:17So what happened when we lodge an FIR against a quack?
04:21So within three days he gets a bail.
04:24Because the offences are considered to be bailable.
04:28We are working in revising our act and incorporating those all punishments for the quacks so that court may not grant them bail in future.
04:38While authorities work on legal mechanisms to end quackery, trainers like Sadia Fazal are trying to address a lack of awareness and dialogue on sex education in Pakistan.
04:51We are working in a lot of awareness.
04:53We need to know that a general physician will be better than a quack.
04:59What I have done with the session is that we have to discriminate against men and women.
05:09How can we discriminate against men and women?
05:11How can we discriminate against men and women?
05:13What can we deal with gender?
05:15What are the responsibilities of gender?
05:19What are their responsibilities with sex?
05:20That's what I have been leader here.
05:21Which was my role in real life.
05:22The interaction with those.
05:24I tried to change their mindset.
05:26That we have to accept that we have to discuss it in meetings.
05:30We have to discuss it in groups.
05:32And open up in the community so that people have been aware.
05:36Fuzzle has been doing this work for almost a decade.
05:42One woman told DW afterwards that she found Fuzzle's talks informative as she had never
05:48attended a session on sex education.
05:53Fuzzle says such trainings are sometimes interrupted by men who don't want their wives
05:58to discuss sex issues.
06:02While challenges remain, Fuzzle hopes her work can help break the conservative social taboos
