HYDERABAD: With junior doctors of
Gandhi Hospital, the
nodal Covid-19 centre, launching a strike on Wednesday over the issue of converting it to a non-Covid-19 centre, state health authorities on Thursday issued orders to begin non-Covid-19 services at the hospital on or before November 21. However, junior doctors refused to call off the strike saying that this is only one part of the demand and the rest of it are not fulfilled.
They boycotted duties on Thursday too demanding that the non-Covid-19 services be started with immediate effect. The junior doctors have been pressing for this demand for over a month now saying that they have lost ‘crucial clinical experience’ during the past eight months of the pandemic.
A committee had been formed three weeks back to plan and execute the transition, and fumigation of wards and other preparations are underway. On Thursday, Dr K Ramesh Reddy, director of
Medical Education, instructed the hospital superintendent to bifurcate Covid-19 and non-Covid-19 areas in the hospital and begin non-Covid-19 services by November 21.
“Staff to be posted in Covid areas should be decided by the hospital superintendent. All the regular hospital work i.e. departmental teaching and other hospitals academic work should start. The hospital superintendent should distribute the staff between Covid and non-Covid wards depending on the load of admissions of Covid patients,” reads the order.