In a first, hundreds of Accredited Social Health Activist (ASHA) workers, nurses, gazetted medical officers and pharmacists came together to expose the apathetic conditions in the public health department. From scarcity of medicines to over 15,000 vacancies at various levels, they agitated against issues affecting patient care, at the Azad Maidan on Wednesday.
The protest was followed by a meeting with State Finance, Planning and Forests Minister Sudhir Mungantiwar and Health Minister Eknath Shinde who promised to resolve the issues soon.
“Not only is this the first time that all these people together protested issues affecting them, but also highlight the larger issues ailing the public health system in the State,” said Dr. Abhijit More of the Jan Swasthya Abhiyan. The service providers came together under the Alliance for Defence of Health Services and Rights, a coalition of public health organisations and unions.
“Due to the severe scarcity of medicines, the nurses often bear the brunt of angry relatives. There are so many instances where nurses were attacked. Vacancies put tremendous pressure on the on-duty staff. This also results in exertion,” said Suman Tilekar, president of the Maharashtra Government Nurses Federation. “We want government authorities to actively look in all these issues,” she said.
ASHA workers came in large numbers from across the State to join the agitation. “As we live in villages and are a part of the community, we are on the job 24x7. But the honorarium we get is extremely demotivating,” said an ASHA worker who came down from Palghar.
“ASHA workers implement about 84 different initiatives of the public health department, but get an honorarium which is very low,” said Bhagwan Deshmukh, who heads an association of ASHAs from Latur. “ASHAs who work in extremely remote tribal areas get around ₹4,000 to 5,000 a month, while those working in other rural areas get much lesser. ASHA workers are the backbone of all these schemes and yet the lowest paid,” he said. They are demanding a fixed monthly salary of ₹10,000 for ASHA workers and ₹15,000 for their head coordinator.
The coalition has decided to intensify its agitation and spread it across the State if the government does not take the necessary steps soon.
