Unmet demands: Young Doctors stage protest demonstration

Protesters say work has been stopped on Mayo Hospital surgical towers

LAHORE: Over 200 people staged a protest rally on Monday against the government for not revising pay scales and service structure of public sector doctors.

The protesters marched from Mayo Hospital to Charing Cross, causing a severe traffic jam.

“The government has cut down the health sector budget. It is diverting the funds to the Orange Line Metro project,” Young Doctors’ Association (YDA) Punjab Mayo Hospital unit general secretary Mazhar Rafique said.

He said that the public sector health facilities were overburdened. “One frequently finds two or more patients on a single bed at government hospitals even in Lahore. Instead of developing more health units, they have stopped work on the under-construction surgical towers at Mayo Hospital,” he said. He said that the surgical towers project had been facing delays since 2006.

He said that Adviser to CM Khawaja Salman Rafique had assured doctors that their pay scales and service structure would be revised. “The promises have not been fulfilled,” he said. Rafique said that the government’s attitude was one of the reasons more and doctors were leaving the country for working abroad.

“The government must consider our demands if they are sincere about improving health facilities,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 22^nd, 2016.