While the young doctors have suspended healthcare services in all public hospitals across Punjab, the senior doctors have been found ‘recommending’ treatment to poor patients at their private clinics and hospitals, Pakistan Today learnt from many a suffering patient.
The poor from across the province have been suffering for the past 11 days owing to the strike announced by the Young Doctors Association (YDA) Punjab. Meant to force the Punjab government to make a service structure for doctors, the strike is supported by all major doctors’ associations. The young doctors have shut down the outpatient departments (OPDs) of all public hospitals with thousands of visiting patients going unattended every day.
To add insult to injury, a bevy of senior doctors has taken as a Godsend, and, in order to make a killing from this adversity for the poor and the lower middle class, have been found to direct the hapless patients to their private clinics for treatment and surgery. “Since the strike may continue for an indefinite period, it’s better to get relief from our private practice”, is the refrain.
“My father’s urinary tract is blocked and we have been getting treatment at the Sheikh Zayed Hospital. On my latest visit, the doctor initially recommended some tests after which he said he will do the required surgery. When we got the tests and took these to the good doctor, he insisted that the condition in the hospital very poor because of the strike. And it would be in the fitness of things if we visited him at his private clinic and get our father operated there.
“It is a question of affordability with us. Now it has been two days and my father is in severe pain because the pipe for urination is blocked after every few hours and there is none to attend to him when we take him to the hospital”, said Muhammad Ilyas of Multan Road.
Quite interestingly, while the public is being made to suffer, the private practices of doctors young and veteran thrive. In fact the private practice gets a boom every time the young doctors go on a strike.
Some young as well senior doctors have condemned the practice, terming it as ‘inhuman’.
“If a senior is using our strike to profit from it, we condemn it in strongest possible terms. We have already said publicly that any patient who is in an emergency situation, he or she should be given treatment. Besides the operation theatres have been made an exception and there is no strike there,” YDA spokesperson Dr Nasir said.
“I will make sure that from today onwards no such incident takes place. I already take rounds of the entire hospital and ensuring that patients were being checked up regularly. And I just spoke to the senior doctors on the matter, asking them avoid recommending patients to private clinics, especially during the strike,” said chairman of the Sheikh Zayed Hospital, Prof. Zafar Iqbal.
