QUETTA, Sept 19: Doctors boycotted the out-patient departments in government-run hospitals on Thursday in protest against the kidnapping of a heart specialist.

The strike call was given by the Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) and the Young Doctors Association (YDA) to put pressure on the police to intensify efforts to get Dr Munaf Tareen freed.

Talking to reporters, the president of the PMA, Balochistan chapter, Dr Sultan Tareen, and YDA leader Dr Kamal called upon the government to recover Dr Tareen within a week or else doctors working in government hospitals would stop attending to patients.

They said it was not the first such case as 19 doctors had been abducted over the past four years and the government and law-enforcement agencies had failed to provide protection to medical practitioners.