…as NARD issues notice of impending action
Doctors treating COVID-19 patients and other emergency cases will from next Monday embark on a strike, National Association of Resident Doctors has said.
Already, NARD, which is the umbrella body of all doctors working in government health facilities, has issued a notice of the impending strike.
The association said doctors attending to COVID-19 patients and other emergencies would also join the strike.
NARD National President, Dr Aliyu Sokomba, announced this in an official letter with reference number NARD/SG/2019-2020/070620/246.
Sokomba said that the NARD strike would be total regardless of the current pandemic.
He said the action became imperative because of government’s failure to redeem its pledges, especially in the areas of salary arrears and working conditions.
According to the NARD notice, “The strike shall, therefore, be total and indefinite. No service of any kind, be it emergency, care at COVID-19 treatment centres shall be exempted and members, including all resident doctors, medical officers below the rank of principal medical officer, and house officers are expected to be part of the strike.”
NARD said although it sympathised with Nigerians and patients as a whole, its members could no longer condone neglect by government.
The association added that its members’ plight in state health facilities was sometimes worse than that of their colleagues in Federal institutions.