YDA plans to crash Nawaz’s homecoming

Say they will not let anybody launch a conspiracy against the medical profession

LAHORE: The Young Doctors Association is all set to crash Nawaz Sharif’s homecoming to Lahore as it plans to hold a protest during his rally which has been scheduled for Wednesday.

According to YDA Jinnah Hospital Chapter General Secretary Dr Asad Ali, the leadership of the medics has called all of its factions to chalk out a strategy to protest against the health department before Nawaz.



“May Nawaz Sharif hear the grief of young doctors as the health department and provincial government has failed to address all issues,” he commented.

He said YDA would not tolerate any kind of conspiracy against the medical profession. “It will continue its struggle until authorities reinstate sacked colleagues, implement the one bed, one attendant policy and sack Secretary for Health Najam Ahmed Shah,” he added.

“The government must form academic councils in all teaching hospitals for the induction of the specialised discipline and revisit the central induction policy,” he demanded.

He said all medical institutes, both private and government, produced more than 7,000 MBBS graduates, but only 1,000 seats of all specialised disciplines were available in Punjab.

“Are they really sincere about increasing health facilities in the province?” he asked. “We request the health department to sit on the negotiation table, otherwise we will increase our protests around Punjab. In the next phase, we will halt all functions of government-run hospitals.”

According to the health department, it sacked more than 66 doctors from different hospitals, while some of them were placed at the disposal of Primary Healthcare department. Others were directed to join the basic health units in far-flung areas.

On Monday, interviews were conducted for the post of trainees at Jinnah hospital where doctors protested against the administration and the health department.

Also, a group of transgender people crashed the YDA protest by launching their own demonstration against the medics. They shouted slogans against the young doctors and claimed the latter were maligning the noble medical profession.

The transgender people were welcomed by the Jinnah hospital administration and offered soft drinks by hospital security guards. YDA claimed that transgender  people were called by the hospital administration. However, authorities at the public medical facility denied these claims, adding they had nothing to do with the protest.



Later on, both YDA activists and transgender protesters dispersed peacefully. A YDA spokesperson said most of the new candidates refused to be interviewed for the post in order to express solidarity with young docors.

However, the administration claimed that they had completed the interviews of candidates and the new inductees would join as soon as possible. The health department spokesman said that those who were terminated by the disciplinary committee could not return as the department had already issued warning letters to them on several occasions.

Meanwhile, a release of the University of Health and Sciences (UHS) said the Punjab government had started inducting new postgraduate medical trainees against seats which fell vacant in various teaching hospitals of Punjab.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 8^th, 2017.