LAHORE: Doctors associated with the Grand Health Alliance (GHA) on Thursday continued their 16th day of protest against the newly introduced Medical Teaching Institute Ordinance (MTI).
GHA considers the MTI project as a bid by the government to privatize the health sector as it believes it would end their status as government employees as well as make treatment expensive for the public.
Protestors staged sit-ins on Jail Road, Mall Road, Ferozpur Road, Canal Road and Queens Road, which resulted in massive traffic jams.
The Grand Health Alliance (GHA) which consists of young doctors, young consultants, nurses, paramedical staff, allied health professionals and all healthcare associations had called a strike against the ordinance and refused to perform their duties including outdoor, operation theatres, radiological and pathological services in major teaching institutions including Mayo Hospital, Services, Hospital, Children’s Hospital, Lahore General Hospital, Jinnah Hospital, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, Shaikh Zayed Hospital, Punjab Institute of Cardiology in Lahore, Rawalpindi and other districts of Punjab.
Poor patients dependent upon public-healthcare service, in the meanwhile, are suffering due to non-operational operation theatres (OTs) in hospitals and are having to bear extra financial burden to seek treatment in private hospitals.
