Kolkata doctor rape-murder: Agitation by resident doctors demanding a central law escalates

New Delhi: As doctors’ protests against the horrific rape and murder of a young female physician in Kolkata spread, residents doctors across the country went on a strike from Monday demanding a CBI probe into the episode, their safety and security while on duty, and a central law to ensure the same.

While more than three lakh resident doctors have joined the strike, more are likely to hit the streets from Tuesday as other associations of doctors will be a part of the nationwide agitation, which is now spreading all over the country.

Representatives of the Federation of Resident Doctors Association met the Union Health Secretary Apurva Chandra with their demand on Monday. They threatened to continue with their strikes till they received a written assurance of their demands.

The doctors said during the strike the emergency services would run normally, but the out patient department services and diagnostics would be curtailed and elective surgeries would be cut drastically.

At AIIMS Delhi where junior and senior residents took part in a sit-on agitation on the road outside the institution, the OT services were down by 80 per cent, admissions were lower by 35 per cent and radiology services were dropped by 40 per cent on Monday.

The Indian Medical Association too came out in support of the agitating doctors.

The association appealed to the Union Health Minister to reconsider introducing a five year old draft legislation on healthcare workers safety that was framed but never introduced in the Parliament.

“We kindly request you to reconsider introducing the draft bill titled The Healthcare Service Personnel and Clinical Establishments

(Prohibition of violence and damage to property) Bill, 2019,” it said in a letter to the Union Health Minister.

The IMA also demanded declaring the hospitals as the safe zones.

“This horrific incident serves as further evidence of the serious weaknesses in the security mechanisms that exist in our nation’s hospitals. We implore the government to hasten the ‘Central Protection Act for Doctors’ implementation to protect the lives and health of our medical professionals,” the National Federation of Resident Doctors of AIIMS said in a statement.

The Federation of All India Medical Association (FAIMA) has given a call for a nationwide protest and shut down of the OPD and elective services from Tuesday.

The demand for such a law is not new, but the Union government so far has rejected the idea arguing that existing laws are adequate to take care of the safety and security of on-duty doctors in hospitals.

“We urgently call for the immediate implementation of the long-pending legal framework in the form of a Central Protection Act for healthcare workers across the country,” the Faculty Association of All India Institute of Medical Sciences said in a letter that has been sent to the Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Union Health Minister J P Nadda.

Sympathetic to the resident doctors, most of the hospitals have made arrangements to run the emergency and in-patient services with the senior staff. While elective surgeries will be stopped at some of the hospitals, in many others it has been left to the Head of the Departments to decide.

The doctors have also reached out to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, seeking a speedy, fair and transparent investigation. “We call for a prompt, unbiased, and open investigation into this horrible act,” it added.