YDA warns of province-wide strike

LAHORE: The Young Doctors Association (YDA) wore black bands and held a protest against the “brutal oppression” of doctors in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. The young doctors expressed complete solidarity with their counterparts in the northern areas of the country.

Talking to The media, YDA Sheikh Zayed Chapter President Dr Qasim Awan said K-P police, influenced by their provincial government, brutally assaulted junior doctors. He stressed that such action were highly condemnable.

“We demand the government immediately release arrested doctors, otherwise we will go on a complete strike,” he warned.



He said the doctors of Punjab just observed a token strike to support their peers, but added there would be a strike across the province if the K-P government failed to release the arrested doctors.

K-P’s YDA held a protest at the Hayatabad Medical Complex where they got involved in heated arguments with the police.

The doctors were against amendments in the Medical Teaching Institutes (MTI) Act and the failure to pay allowances.

The doctors were trying to lock the OPD and emergency wards when security officers baton charged them.

Three of the medics were taken into custody. The protesters warned that the provincial government would not be allowed to amend the MTI Act at any cost.

They also demanded the sacking of the chairman of the hospital’s board of directors.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 15^th, 2017.