Doctors peacefully protest lack of safety gear

YDA Sindh asks for PPE, health allowances, payment of salaries, more ventilators

KARACHI: Displaying black armbands, the Young Doctors Association's (YDA) Sindh chapter peacefully protested the unavailability of personal protective equipment (PPE) and other safety gear to reduce their exposure to COVID-19 as they continued to fulfil their responsibilities in the government hospitals of Karachi and Sindh on Monday.

YDA Sindh chairperson Dr Omer Sultan outlined six demands, saying they should be accepted immediately. The demands include the provision of personal protective equipment (PPE); provision of health allowances, like those offered in Punjab, to the doctors of Sindh; the immediate payment of salaries to the doctors of Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur and Larkana; an increase in the number of ventilators in the province's government hospitals; the launch of large-scale testing and screening of coronavirus in Sindh; and the establishment of separate hospitals for infectious diseases in all districts of Sindh.

Dr Sultan claimed that the PPE kits provided by the Sindh health department had not yet reached the doctors, adding that only a quarter of the doctors were provided the kits on a daily basis. He further pointed out that the situation in Karachi was still better than in other districts of Sindh, where most of the doctors were deprived of safety gear and measures.

According to him, 200 doctors are serving on the frontline at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre everyday, where 5,000 kits have been provided by the health department.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 7^th, 2020.