The couple ran from one corner of the hospital to another for hours to meet doctors at the outpatient department (OPD) and also get the stitches given to the child removed before they finally gave up. “The doctors had asked us to visit the OPD and also get the stitches removed. We have been here since morning but all services are shut here. We are going back. We have no choice,” said Mollah.
The Mollahs were among thousands of patients who had a harrowing time at the government medical college and hospitals across West Bengal on Monday and Tuesday after doctors observed a complete strike in protest against the rape and murder of a junior female doctor at the RG Kar Hospital last week.
In front of the RG Kar’s trauma care centre, Sudhir Biswas (60), a resident of Rajchandrapur in Howrah district, lay helpless on a stretcher. Biswas suffered a stroke and was taken to a local nursing home where doctors referred him to the RG Kar Hospital. His sister-in-law Baby Sadhukhan said, “For more than an hour, we are running from the emergency to the trauma care centre. Now they are saying there are no doctors and we need to take the patient somewhere else. He is gasping for breath. What should we do?”
Aslam Mollah of Gocharan near New Town who brought his father Alambari Mollah (65) after he had pain in the chest returned without any treatment.
“All the OPDs are closed. What should we do? My father has severe chest pain. Local doctors asked me to immediately take him to a medical college which has good doctors and facilities. But no one is working here,” said Aslam.
At the Sagore Dutta Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata’s Kamarhati, 78-year-old Nazima Khatoon of Panihati of North 24 Parganas was seen screaming in pain when the guards at the gate asked her attendants to wait till they confirmed availability of a doctor. “A guard came back only to inform us that there was only one doctor at the emergency and suggested we go to another hospital,” Khatoon’s attendant said.
The resident doctors of all medical college and hospitals in the state have scaled up their protest and struck work, including all emergency and non-emergency services from Monday. Earlier, the doctors in these hospitals were observing strike for non-emergency services only.
On Tuesday, most of the OPDs remain shut with only a handful of senior doctors manning the emergency wards.
On an average, government medical college and hospitals, which also serve as referral institutions, daily receive nearly 2,500 OPD patients each and more than 1,000 patients in emergency wards.
A security guard deployed at the emergency ward of a hospital said, “We have been told to only allow only critical patients inside. There is only one doctor on the ground floor. No doctor is available on other floors. Even if someone is admitted, they are not being attended to. The OPDs are completely shut.”
A senior doctor at the gynecology department of the Sagore Dutta Hospital said, “We are doctors and have no problem in attending to our patients but this cause is much bigger. We will continue to fight for justice.”
Click here to join The Indian Express on WhatsApp and get latest news and updates