Doctors in government service, who are objecting to change in the working hours of primary health centres, have decided to intensify their agitation, including boycotting the mass vaccination camps from August 11. A decision to this effect was taken on Sunday after an emergency meeting of the State executive committee of the Service Doctors and Post Graduates Association.
The association has objected to the change of work timings at PHCs. It was earlier 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The government recently advanced it to 8 a.m. “There is no point in asking us to come early as most patients are rural workers who would come in only after finishing their farm work. The OP ward will continue up to 1 p.m. in such centres unlike in urban PHCs,” said association president A. Ramalingam.
The doctors have demanded abolition of call duty for medical officers for want of transportation, remuneration and accommodation facilities. Dr. Ramalingam said PHCs were in interior regions and were serviced by buses only at certain hours.
“Usually, the doctors, the hospital staff and patients would travel by the same bus. With more than 60% of the doctors being women, they have to tend to their homes and then come to work,” he said.
The doctors are irked that the government wanted them to spend from their pocket to organise camps under government schemes such as Makkalai Thedi Maruthuvam and Mobile Medical Units. “SDPGA demands to release the funds well in advance to carry out the programmes,” he said.
The doctors have demanded that the government recruit sufficient number of pharmacists, staff nurses, lower level staff, security and biomedical waste collection personnel. If their demands are not met, the association has decided to start a “series of democratic mode of agitations immediately.” The association has urged members to exit from the official WhatsApp groups, stop sending reports and boycott official meetings. It has suggested that the members stop paying from their own pocket and boycott camps, including mega vaccination camps from August 11.
If the government did not withdraw its order despite such agitations, the association warned it would intensify its protest “with like-minded associations.”
These doctors say the government had surrendered several hundred posts of lower level staff to enable recruitment of more doctors. “We need staff to maintain the medical centres. If a toilet is not cleaned, then the patients immediately take a photo and share it. We, doctors and nurses, are pulled up for this as well,” said Dr. Ramalingam.
The Tamil Nadu Government Doctors’ Association has demanded the withdrawal of the Government Order 225. Given that doctors are working longer hours and that they must remain on call even after their duty ends at 4 p.m., the doctors would be working beyond 40 hours, the limit recommended by the Centre.
