India, Pak to increase interaction in health sector

India and Pakistan today favoured increasing interaction between the two countries in the health sector with Islamabad evincing keen interest in schemes for welfare of new mothers and "novel experiments" like the condom-vending machines.
    
Pakistan's population welfare minister Firdous Ashiq Awan, who met health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad here, said there was a lot to learn from India's experiences in population control.
    
She sought increased cooperation between the two countries in the health sector.
    
On the condom-vending machines she said it was a "novel experiment which could be replicated in Pakistan", health ministry sources said.
    
Awan, who was accompanied by Pakistani high commissioner to India Shahid Malik, also appreciated the declining maternal mortality rates in India and said Pakistan had a lot to learn from special programmes for mothers and children like the 'Janani Suraksha Yojana'.
    
On his part, Azad said, the two countries should find ways to increase interaction in the health sector, the sources said.