Emergency services remained operative as doctors stayed on duty there, but no YDA members were present at OPDs or IPDs, says YDA representative. PHOTO: FILE
Young doctors observed partial strike at public hospitals in Rawalpindi on Monday to protest against the use of force on their colleagues by the Lahore police yesterday.
The Young Doctors Association ghad given a call for boycotting both outpatient and inpatients departments at Holy Family Hospital (HFH), Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH) and District Headquarter Hospital (DHQ) to protest the use of force by police against protesting doctors at the launch of the metro bus service in Lahore.
Inpatients and those at OPDs largely went unattended as protesting doctors were absent from their duties. “My brother has to undergo an appendix surgery at HFH on Monday morning but we were informed the due to the absence of doctors, the operation had been deferred till Tuesday,” said Muhammad Zeeshan.
Long queues of patients were seen at the OPDs in HFH and BBH as they kept waiting for doctors. A small number of senior doctors were left to manage the patient load by themselves. Dr Abbas Malik, the YDA representative at DHQ, said emergency services remained operative as doctors stayed on duty there, but no YDA members were present at OPDs or IPDs.
However, DHQ Emergency Services Director Dr Khalid Janjua said all the hospital’s departments remained fully operative and that young doctors attended to their patients on Monday.
YDA HFH President Dr Waleed Abbasi said the doctors did not attend OPDs or IPDs in the hospital and all elective activities on Monday were cancelled.
YDA Rawalpindi President Dr Umer Saeed, who serves at BBH, said a partial strike was observed on Monday as many doctors were released by the Lahore police.
Doctors were absent from duty on Monday morning but they started coming back as soon as they learnt about the release of their detained colleagues in Lahore, Saeed noted. He believed the strike would end by Tuesday as the government had released all the arrested doctors.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 12th, 2013.
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