Nagpur: Resident doctors in the state-run medical colleges in Maharashtra have raised the strike weapon again claiming the government is not paying heed to their problems.
After the residents in Nair Medical College in Mumbai went on mass leave protest from Monday, their counterparts in Indira Gandhi Government Medical College and Hospital (IGGMCH) in Nagpur have decided to follow them.
On Tuesday, IGGMCH residents issued an ultimatum to the dean stating they will withdraw services from out-patient departments (OPDs) and wards, including Covid wards, from April 7 onwards.
“If our requests are not considered and if the same scenario repeats wherein residents only have to face the brunt of the situation, we would be left with no choice but to withdraw our services in OPDs, wards (including Covid wards) from 12 noon of Wednesday,” reads the ultimatum signed by Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors (MARD) president at IGGMCH, Dr Rajat Agrawal and secretary Dr Ashish Kendre.
While residents will stop work in wards, they will continue their services in intensive care units. “We assure that emergency services (SARI, Covid and non-Covid ICUs) will not be hampered. But in case our demands remain unmet, then we would be left with no choice but to withdraw from emergency services too,” the letter reads.
Dr Agrawal told TOI that copy of the ultimatum has been sent to district health officer and Nagpur civil surgeon for reference.
“We have served as frontline workers since the onset of the pandemic irrespective of our specializations. Even treatment protocols were not fixed at that time,” said Dr Agrawal.
“We have suffered through academic loss of one year and still counting. Violating public health guidelines, we have been assigned for approximately 56 hours / week duty in Covid wards. We don’t even get any Covid allowance, neither any exemption from fees, nor any relaxation in thesis submission,” he added.
The medicos also alleged that they were provided extremely poor quality personal protective equipment (PPE) kits putting them at great risk.