YDA threatens to enter red zone again

Lambasting the provincial government for failing to address the issues of the Young Doctors Association (YDA), Dr Hafeez Mandokhail, the YDA chief, has announced they will enter the red zone of Quetta on Thursday in a bid to mount pressure on authorities to accept their demands.

Addressing a presser at Quetta Press Club on Monday, Dr Mandokhail said, “We are demanding solution of our issues but the government is not serious.”

It is pertinent to mention that for more than six months, the YDA has been observing a boycott of OPDs across the province in support of their demands.

“Despite repeated assurances, the government has failed to address our issues”, the YDA chief added.

Patients remained the worst sufferers of doctors strike in Quetta and other parts of Balochistan. The government has held repeated negotiations, but the defiant doctors are not ready to call off the strike.

Almost a month ago, Balochistan health minister, Syed Ehsan Shah, and YDA representatives addressed a joint news conference at the CM Secretariat, announcing a breakthrough apart from calling off the strike very soon.

“Government is committed to solving doctors’ issues, but they have to realize the difficulties of the masses”, Shah said.

He urged doctors to end the boycott of the OPDs and start treating patients.

Daily OPD in Quetta’s largest Bolan Medical Complex Hospital and Civil Hospital is more than 10,000. The patients come and go back in despair since there is no doctor to treat them, a senior doctor, on the condition of anonymity, told The Express Tribune. He requested anonymity since he feared a reaction from the young doctors.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 15^th, 2022.