Patients find OPDs shuttered as young doctors go on strike

Thousands of patients suffered in Karachi and other cities of Sindh on Monday after young doctors boycotted duties at outpatient departments (OPDs) in a protest against meagre salaries and the non-availability of medicines at public hospitals in the province.

After the boycott, the young doctors of Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), National Institute of Child Health (NICH), Civil Hospital Karachi (CHK), Lyari General Hospital and other public hospitals also held demonstrations at their institutes and chanted slogans in favour of their demands.

They warned authorities that if their demands were not met within the next few days, they would also boycott duties in patient wards and in the later stage, would stop serving at emergencies and casualty wards.

During the day, the Sindh government or health department did not approach the protesting doctors or their representatives to learn about their demands. However, in the evening the government replaced Additional Chief Secretary Health Dr Muhammad Usman Chachar with Saeed Awan. According to officials in the provincial government, this move was carried out because of his failure to deal with and pre-empt the young doctors’ strike.

Patients visiting public health facilities were shocked on Monday morning after they learnt that OPDs were closed due to the strike and protest by the young doctors. They were asked to wait outside the OPDs as the administrations tried to convince the doctors to end their protest, but the doctors refused to listen and continued protesting against what they called discrimination with Sindh’s doctors. They demanded that the Sindh health department pay salaries similar to what doctors in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were earning.

“Today thousands of young doctors boycotted OPD services at the public hospitals in Karachi as well as other major cities of Sindh against discrimination meted out to them by the Sindh health department,” Young Doctors Association Chairman Dr Umer Sultan said. “We have only two demands: give us salaries as young doctors are being paid in Punjab and KP and start supplying medicines to the patients at hospitals, which are not being supplied for last three months.”

He claimed that doctors in Punjab and KP were getting a lot better salaries as well as perks, privileges and allowances as compared to doctors in Sindh and added that medicines were also not being supplied at hospitals for the last three months, owing to which patients were already suffering and cursing doctors for the provincial government’s wrongdoing.

The protesting doctors said they would continue their boycott of OPDs for the next three days and warned that if their demands were not met within these days, they would be compelled to boycott health services at wards and later in emergency departments.

The JPMC administration lamented that young doctors boycotted OPDs which caused hardships to a large number of patients who had come from across Sindh and some areas of Balohcistan.

The officials added that despite the protest, they provided the necessary medical treatment to serious patients at the emergency even though it was already overloaded.

Civil Hospital Karachi and administrations of other hospitals also confirmed that patients suffered due to the boycott of OPDs by the young doctors and urged the provincial government, health department and the Sindh health minister to intervene and resolve this issue so that patients could be provided healthcare services without any interruption.

‘Support only demands’

The Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) made it clear that it does not support the boycott of health services and facilities at public hospitals at any cost, saying the doctors’ demands were legitimate and the government should listen to them and try to resolve their issues at the earliest.

“Today thousands of patients suffered due to strike by the young doctors and some of our office-bearers supported this boycott but PMA Centre believes that health services should not be denied to patients at any cost as this mode of protest results in agony for patients, who are so poor that they cannot avail health services at private healthcare facilities,” said PMA Centre Secretary General Dr Qaiser Sajjad.

He urged both the doctors and the government to sit together and sort out their issues, demanding the government to pay attention to the demands of the young doctors and pay them remuneration similar to what their colleagues are getting in other provinces.