Staff Reporter

The 10-member medical board, formed to ensure the treatment of BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia, sat in a meeting on Saturday at Evercare Hospital to review her health condition.

“The meeting of the medical board began around 11:10am to review the medical reports and health condition of Khaleda Zia,” said her media wing member Sayrul Kabir Khan.

Earlier talking to UNB, Dr AZM Zahid Hossain, a member of the medical board, said they will review the medical test reports and decide the next course of treatment of the BNP chief. On 28 April 2021, a 10-member medical board, headed by Prof Shahabuddin Talukder, was formed for the treatment of Khaleda at the Evercare Hospital. The same medical board will now oversee Khaleda’s treatment.

Asked about Khaleda’s condition in the morning, he said nothing can be said about it now as her condition can take any turn at any time. “She will kept in observation at CCU for 72 hours.”

Zahid said Khaleda Zia has long been suffering from various critical diseases, including heart, liver and kidney complications. “She needs to receive advanced treatment abroad, but the government has long been denying her permission to go there.”

He believes Khaleda will be able to recover completely if she is allowed to go abroad for treatment.

Earlier, Khaleda Zia was admitted to Evercare Hospital in the capital in the early hours of Saturday as she suddenly fell ill.

"Madam (Khaleda) suddenly fell ill at her Gulshan home. We rushed her to Evercare Hospital," Khaleda's physician Professor AZM Zahid Hossain told UNB.
The BNP chief was taken to the coronary care unit (CCU) of the hospital at 3:20am, he added.

The BNP chief left her Gulshan residence for the hospital at 2:55amand was admitted there at 3:15am, said her media wing member Sayrul Kabir Khan.

Hearing the news of Khaleda's illness, BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir rushed to her Gulshan residence and later went to the hospital.

Coming out of the hospital around 4:30am, Fakhrul said after some primary tests, the doctors found that she has cardiac problems.

"Madam's condition is stable now. How complicated her problem is can be confirmed after she undergoes different tests, especially an angiogram," he said.

A medical board will analyse Khaleda's condition and her medical reports at 10:30am Saturday and decide the next course of treatment, Fakhrul added.

He hoped that Khaleda would recover as she did in the past.

The BNP leader urged the country’s people to pray for her speedy recovery. It is for the fifth time the BNP was admitted to the hospital since she was infected with Covid-19 in April 2021.

The BNP chairperson last went to Evercare on April 6 for health check-ups.

Khaleda, a former prime minister, has been suffering from various ailments, including liver cirrhosis, arthritis, diabetes, kidney, lung and eye problems.

The 76-year-old was last admitted to Evercare on November 13 last year where she was diagnosed with liver cirrhosis.

On February 1, Khaleda returned home after an 81-day stay at the hospital as she was suffering from internal bleeding caused by liver cirrhosis.

The former prime minister was sent to the Old Dhaka Central Jail as a lower court sentenced her to five years' imprisonment in the Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case on February 8, 2018.

Later, she was found guilty in another corruption case the same year.

Amid the Covid-19 pandemic, the government temporarily freed Khaleda from jail through an executive order suspending her sentence on March 25, 2020, with conditions that she will stay at her Gulshan home and not leave the country.