Patients suffer as young doctors continue to boycott OPDs in Quetta

QUETTA: As young doctors boycott OPDs to protest against the arrest of fellow doctors, hundreds of patients continue to face difficulties.

The protesting doctors have warned the provincial government that they will continue to protest if their demands are not met.

Despite the Balochistan High Court order, the protest of paramedical staff and the young doctors is ongoing.

Provincial Minister for Communications Sardar Abdul Rehman Khetran also reprimanded the behaviour of the doctors and said that doctors are saviours and it is erroneous to close OPD. He further said that the demands were beyond the doctors’ jurisdiction.

On November 28, police had arrested 19 doctors and paramedics staff for staging a protest sit-in and blocking roads linking the city’s Red Zone with its other areas.

The doctors were protesting for a week near the red zone area seeking fulfilment of their demands. Earlier, the Balochistan High Court had also asked the doctors to end their protest sit-in.

Read more: Those blocking roads could be arrested without warrant in Balochistan

Poice had also lodged FIRs against the arrested people for violating the Criminal Law Ordinance (passed on November 27 that banned rallies, processions and sit-ins on streets, roads and highways) and coronavirus standard operating procedures (SOPs).