Docs, hospital staffers demand safety in R’kla

Leading doctors and hospital staffs of private hospitals of the city, under the banner of Rourkela Private Hospital Owners’ Association (RPHOA), staged a rally from STI square to Rourkela ADM office on Wednesday protesting the rise in attack against the doctors and hospital staffs.

A delegation met Rourkela ADM Monisha Banerjee and handed over a memorandum addressed to the Sundargarh Collector and the Health Secretary of the State.

They claimed that the Government should introduce a law for protection  of doctors and hospitals, for protecting them from violent and abusive mob activities, which are on rise after the death of a patient in hospital.

The memorandum blamed the complicated rules of Government, responsible for a majority of the hospital and nursing homes not having fire safety certificates. "More than 90 per cent of the Clinical Establishments (CE) of the State do not have fire safety certificate as the rules for obtaining the certificate is complicated one," the memorandum said. "We request for a practical and reasonable approach to implement the same to achieve the common objective of basic fire safety requirements, without disrupting day to day healthcare service for the public," the memorandum added.

"Since, maximum CEs of Rourkela, including Rourkela Government Hospital and Ispat General Hospital do not have a valid fire safety certificate, resorting to closure of all these hospitals would adversely affect the health care facility of the general public," the memorandum said.

"Since, most of these hospitals of the city are functioning in residential areas over a long period of time, we request the authorities to be lenient in granting necessary permission for continuance of these hospitals, as they have been providing health care service to local public," the agitators said. Claiming that treatment of patients is not a trade, the RPHOA demanded that the trade licence system for the hospital should be abolished.