OPDs closure causes major inconveniences to patients
Kolkata: Health services in outpatient departments (OPDs) all medical colleges in the city and also in private hospitals crippled on Wednesday as the senior doctors observed a one-day OPD shutdown leading to a serious inconvenience of patients.
Apart from the OPDs, health care services were hit in various non-emergency departments at almost all hospitals across Bengal as doctors continued their ceasework on Wednesday, protesting the alleged rape and murder of a woman doctor.
Long queues were seen at ticket counters of OPDs of all government hospitals where senior doctors joined their junior counterparts to protest against the crime.
The Joint Platform of Doctors West Bengal (JPDWB), comprising senior doctors from private and government hospitals on Tuesday called for a shutdown on Wednesday. In a rare show of solidarity, this is the first time that both government and corporate-sector doctors have called for the OPD closure, claimed JPDWB.
The platform for doctors has already raised concerns over the renovation in the respiratory medicine department adjacent to the seminar hall, the scene of the crime. They alleged it was another attempt at tampering with evidence in the crime scene.
“Shutdown” was carried out in OPDs of various medical colleges, including Calcutta National Medical College, SSKM, NRS Medical College, Calcutta Medical College, besides RG Kar. They shouted slogans that security has to be enhanced in work places. The OPDs were shut in private hospitals as well till 4 pm on Wednesday.
Junior and senior doctors, interns and house staff were seen wearing blackbands on their arms and shouting slogans, demanding justice for the woman doctor. “The emergency services are on. But unless we protest, the victim will not get justice. We are sorry for the inconvenience caused to some patients,” a protesting doctor said.
Incidentally, the Calcutta High Court on Tuesday ordered the transfer of the probe into the alleged rape and murder of the doctor from the Kolkata Police to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
