Health professionals attended to only critical patients across Prakasam district on Friday as part of their nation-wide protests against the increasing attacks on doctors and hospitals.
The situation during the pandemic had only turned worse as the relatives of patients blamed the health professionals for deaths, caused due to reasons beyond their control, said IMA city unit president Veeraiah Chowdhary.
All out-patient services were halted by the health centres on Friday to press their demand for enactment of a legislation by the Centre to award stringent punishment to those who attacked doctors. However, COVID patients were attended to by the health professionals.
It had come to their notice that many patients approached quacks for treatment of coronavirus and visited hospitals belatedly leading to complications, said IMA Andhra Pradesh unit former president R. Jayasekhar. The Union government should do away with Goods and Services Tax(GST) on all equipment required to treat patients.
The Centre should take note of the fact that developed countries had now become mask-free thanks to vigorous vaccination drive in those countries. If needed, vaccine should be imported from other countries to cover a majority of the people who were still waiting their turn to take the jab, he added.
