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Sassoon as doctors’ body goes on strike, non-emergency services hit
The strike has been declared statewide by the respective organisation’s chapter in different districts in the state which will likely affect the non-emergency services at Sassoon General hospital, Pune city’s largest government hospital which also includes the planned surgeries and the daily OPD services at the hospital
Two organisations, one working for resident doctors and another for medical officers have declared to go on an indefinite strike against the government and the administration to meet the unmet demands. The strike has been declared statewide by the respective organisation’s chapter in different districts in the state which will likely affect the non-emergency services at Sassoon General hospital, Pune city’s largest government hospital which also includes the planned surgeries and the daily OPD services at the hospital.
Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors (MARD) that covers doctors studying postgraduate course at BJ Medical College is protesting against fees collection by the medical education department for their courses as the students state that the academics at the colleges were completely affected last year due to Covid and that the students participated in Covid duties at all government hospitals during both the peaks.
On Friday, over 427 residents went on a strike which affected the non-emergency services at the Sassoon General hospital like daily OPDs, routine laboratory work, routine department work and also planned surgeries. Only emergency work, covid wards and non-covid ICU continued to function with limited staff.
Dr Vijay Yadav, president, Pune MARD at BJ Medical College said, “It has been two days but despite our discussions there has been no positive response from the medical education minister. It feels like we are being ignored and so the central MARD has decided to further intensify the strike till we get a positive dialogue from the government. The first year batch is yet to join but there are more than 400 resident doctors in second and third year who have worked for more than a year in Covid wards and we hardly had any academics in that year and so we are requesting the government to waive off the college fees.”
Medical College Medical Officers Association (MCMOA) has declared to go on an indefinite strike if there is no positive response for their demands. MCMOA had reached out to the medical education minister Amit Deshmukh. Resident medical officer Dr Bharti Gajanan said, “We have received a positive response from the minister on Saturday who has promised to take a decision in favour of our demands and so we have called off the strike as of now for 15 days. The organisation has demanded permanent jobs for those who have worked in government hospitals for more than two years and also to ensure salaries for the medical officers who are also gazetted officers as per the seventh pay commission instead of a fixed amount. No work was affected at the hospital on Saturday and now for another 15 days we continue to wait for the government’s positive response.”
With both the organisations planning to go on strike at the same time, the hospital is running at a limited staff which is affecting the routine services at the hospital.
