Patients hassled as Haryana govt doctors go on indefinite strike
The strike was called by the Haryana Civil Medical Services Association (HCMSA) to press for their demands, including the formation of a specialist cadre and a career progression scheme, that ensures parity with their central government peers
Government doctors in Haryana went on an indefinite strike on Thursday to protest the non-fulfilment of their demands, crippling health services at government-run health centres across the state.
The strike was called by the Haryana Civil Medical Services Association (HCMSA) to press for their demands, including the formation of a specialist cadre and a career progression scheme, that ensures parity with their central government peers.
The strike left patients in dearth of health services and were seen running pillar to post, as apart from the out-patient department (OPD) services, the emergency, post-mortem, gynaecologist and other essential services, remained unavailable.
There are nearly 150 state-run hospitals and health centres in the state, while nearly 2,500 doctors are associated with the association.
At Karnal civil hospital, Buddhu Ram, a daily wager, was unable to meet his doctor for post operation checkup.
“I visited the doctor to get medicine as I was experiencing pain from last two days. I was unaware of the strike and the attendant asked me to visit again in two-three days. I don’t know what to do,” he said.
Similarly, another patient, Dulari Kumari said that she was also not aware of the strike and reached the hospital after taking a day-off.
“I’ve severe pain in my left foot and visited the hospital. Here, I was told that doctors are not available today. I might have to look for a private doctor as I can’t afford another day off,” she said.
In Panipat, the absence of doctors at the mortuary of at civil hospital left relatives of a grocery store owner, who died in a railway accident, waiting for the dead body for several hours to perform the last rites.
At the same hospital building, Panipat civil surgeon Jayant Ahuja with the help of health staff had to provide treatment to an 11-year-old boy admitted in emergency due to snake bite.
Similar impact was seen at hospitals of Panchkula, Ambala, Rohtak, Hisar, Yamunanagar, Fatehabad and other districts of the state.
At a few places, patients in OPDs said they were attended to by doctors undergoing postgraduate training, doing internship and retired doctors.
Karnal civil surgeon Dr Krishan Kumar said that the services of consultants, community health officers and other health staff have been taken to cater to emergency and child services.
Strike by nursing staff added to woes
The strike added to the woes of patients as the members of nursing staff are also observing “pen-down” symbolic protests in the state for two hours, started this week.
Amid the nurse’s strike at Mukand Lal district civil hospital, there was a face-off between the protestors and Yamunanagar civil surgeon Dr Manjeet Singh, who reportedly asked them to change their protest site out of the premises.
Association president Dr Rajesh Khyalia had on Wednesday started an indefinite hunger strike in front of the office of the health services director general in Panchkula along with three other doctors.
He said, “Over the past several months, we have been given repeated assurances pertaining to our various demands but those remain unfulfilled. So, we have decided to observe a total shutdown of health services, including OPD, emergency, post-mortem. On July 18, we were assured by the additional chief secretary health that a notification would be issued before July 24 pertaining to two demands -- assured career progression and the bond issue -- but nothing happened. We had told the government a month ago that we would be compelled to shut down all services from July 25 if the demands were not met.”
The other demands of the doctors include no direct recruitment of senior medical officers and reduction in the bond amount for postgraduate courses.
Association state treasurer Dr Deepak Goyal said that despite several meetings, their issues remain unresolved.
On July 15, government doctors had observed a two-hour strike to press for their demands which had affected OPD services in government healthcare institutions across the state.