Young doctors call off strike as govt gives in to their demands

After causing extreme agony for thousands of patients by forcing public hospitals’ outpatient departments (OPDs) closed for three days, the protesting young doctors on Wednesday announced that they had ended their strike after the Sindh government accepted their demands regarding an increase in their salaries and allowances.

“Doctors have decided to call off their boycott of OPDs and end their strike after the Sindh government accepted their demands in principle and assured them of bringing their salaries and allowances on a par with Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa,” Barrister Murtaza Wahab, the adviser to the Sindh chief minister on information, told a news conference at the Sindh Assembly building.

Accompanied by newly appointed health secretary Saeed Awan, Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) Sindh President Dr Pir Manzoor and Young Doctors Association (YDA) Sindh Chairman Dr Umar Sultan, Wahab said the provincial health department would move a summary to the CM for the acceptance of the young doctors’ demands. He added that salaries of the doctors would be made on a par with Punjab and KP’s doctors within a week.

“Sindh Health Minister Dr Azra Pechuho and Secretary Health Saeed Awan held negotiations with doctors’ representatives and the provincial government has accepted the basic demands of the protesting doctors regarding an increase in their remuneration,” the information adviser explained, adding that the protesting doctors had also called off their strike and promised that as a goodwill gesture, they would serve for 14 hours a day at the public hospitals, instead of 12 hours.

The PMA Sindh and YDA Sindh presidents expressed hope that the government would honour its commitments and issue the notification regarding the increase in doctors’ salaries and allowances within one week.

Governor criticised

Wahab also criticised Sindh Governor Imran Ismail for his refusal to give assent to two bills recently passed by the Sindh Assembly – including one regarding the establishment of the Sindh Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases, which would comprise the satellite centres of the National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases.

The governor raised baseless objections to the two bills passed by the provincial assembly, the information adviser said, claiming that the MPAs of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) were also not supporting the governor’s objections.

Wahab advised the PTI leaders to put an end to their petty politics, and serve people who voted them to power. He maintained that the Sindh government was serving people of the entire country by establishing and running health institutions where people from other provinces were availing high-quality medical treatment facilities.

Strike on third day

Thousands of patients continued to suffer on the third consecutive day on Wednesday as the young doctors continued their boycott of OPDs at the public hospitals in order to press the authorities to accept their demands.

The OPDs at all the public hospitals in Karachi, including the National Institute of Child Health (NICH), Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), Dr Ruth KM Pfau Civil Hospital Karachi and Lyari General Hospital, as well as several district and taluka hospitals in the province remained closed due to the strike.

The doctors affiliated with the YDA not only themselves boycotted the OPDs but also stopped others from serving their duties at the hospitals. They prevented senior doctors, professors and heads of departments to provide medical treatment to OPD patients.

During the strike, patients were seen moving from one place to another at the public health facilities in search of medical treatment as emergencies of the hospitals were overcrowded. Many patients who had come to Karachi from Sindh and many areas of Balochistan for medical treatment also returned back without receiving medical advice or treatment owing to the protest of the doctors and their boycott of the OPDs.

Some patients alleged that doctors who were not attending OPDs at the public hospitals were asking the patients to go to private hospitals or visit their private clinics in the evening. They demanded that the health department resolve the issue at the earliest so that they could avail medical facilities at the public hospitals.