ISLAMABAD: Three-time former PM Nawaz Sharif has “some residual angina (chest pain) symptoms” that will require “frequent follow-up investigations in London and Pakistan”, according to a medical report submitted to the Lahore high court on Friday ahead of his October 21 return from London after four years in self-imposed exile.
Nawaz had left for the UK in 2019 on medical grounds while serving a seven-year jail term for graft. The Lahore HC had allowed him to travel abroad initially for four weeks, extendable on the basis of health reports. But Nawaz never returned to Pakistan and was declared a proclaimed offender in various corruption cases.
Nawaz’s brother and former PM Shehbaz Sharif had also submitted an undertaking to provide such medical reports to the court periodically.
This time, leaders of the Sharifs’ PML-N have said Nawaz will secure bail and surrender to courts after a reception in his honour in Lahore.
The latest medical report is signed by Carlo Di Mario, a cardiologist who says he has been treating Nawaz for a host of complications “throughout his stay in London”. These include “coronary artery bypass grafting, multiple angioplasties and ablations”.
“We first tried treatment, strengthening his anti-anginal therapy. His persistent anginal symptoms and restrictions imposed by the Covid-19 epidemic precluded a safe return of (Nawaz) to Pakistan,” the report states.
When Nawaz’s symptoms “worsened”, another angioplasty was conducted in November 2022. “(Nawaz) Sharif still has some residual anginal symptoms due to diffuse distal coronary disease in a patient with diabetes and multiple other co-morbidities that would require frequent follow-up investigations both in London and Pakistan,” the report adds.