DOCTORS’ STRIKE: We’re dying, patients cry out

Three days into the ongoing strike by
public sector doctors, patients abandoned
in hospitals nationwide, yesterday, cried
out that they were dying slowly, and
prayed for God’s intervention to settle the
rift between the government and the
striking doctors.

While Governor Babatunde Fashola of
Lagos State appealed to the doctors to stop
using strike as a means of fighting for
their demands in the interest of innocent
Nigerians, the doctors on their part
accussed government of playing hide-and-
seek with them.

Meanwhile, the House of Representatives
has mandated its Committee on Health to
urgently engage the Nigerian Medical
Association, NMA, and Ministry of Health
with a view to bringing the ongoing
industrial action to an end.
Vanguard visited public hospitals in Lagos.

From Lagos University Teaching Hospital,
LUTH; General Hospital, Gbagada; Federal
Medical Centre, Ebute Metta, to Lagos
University Teaching Hospital, LASUTH,
were lamentations as patients, who refused
to relocate, have been abandoned to their
fate.

New patients were denied admission, while
elderly ones who refused to leave were
offered skeletal services by nurses and
other health workers not affected by the
strike.
Seeking divine intervention
Some of the patients were seen praying for
God’s intervention.

At the National Orthopaedic Hospital,
Igbobi, Lagos, patients stood in front of
Accident and Emergency Unit, praying to
God to touch the heart of both government
and the striking doctors.

One said: “Our God in heaven, listen to our
cry and come to our aid. Arrest the heart
of doctors and government to end the
strike. We are dying slowly on daily basis.”

At other wards, some patients that spoke to
Vanguard insisted that whether the strike
continued or not, they had nowhere else to
seek medical attention.
They claimed their medical needs were
peculiar and could not easily be handled at
private hospitals.

One of them, who identified himself as
Clement Odia, and had been on admission
since January, said he was not in a hurry
to relocate to any private hospital for
financial reason.
‘Am going nowhere’
He said: “I came here since January
because of my broken hand. You do not
expect me to leave now because I am
almost healed.

If I have to go to private
clinic, where is the money? Also, they may
not be able to take care of my situation, so
I am staying here.”
Another patient, who spoke on condition of
anonymity, accused doctors of aggravating
his pain.
He said: “I know if government answers
them, in another six months same doctors
will ask for more allowances. No doctor
has attended to me since yesterday.”