LAHORE: The Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) and other bodies on Wednesday lodged a protest against the Punjab government’s move to privatise the state-run hospitals of the province and issued a warning to expand the scope of agitation, setting the Sept 16 deadline for review and accept other demands.

Scores of doctors from many districts of the province joined the gathering in Lahore on the call of the PMA.

The office-bearers and the representatives of Pakistan Academy of Family Physicians (PAFP), the Young Doctors Association (YDA) Punjab also participated in the agitation.

The doctors under the banner of the PMA staged a sit-in outside the office of the Punjab Healthcare Commission as a token strike and held a convention separately to put pressure on the provincial government for the acceptance of their demands.

The PMA declared privatising the state-run hospitals of the Punjab government ‘an anti-doctors policy’ saying that it would destroy the prime objective of providing free access and treatment to patients.

Addressing at the convocation, the senior leaders of the PMA said a meeting was held between the delegation of the doctors and the healthcare commission to deliberate on the issues raised by the medics.

Both sides agreed to resolve the nine points of the meeting and gave the Sept 16 deadline to the authorities concerned to ensure implementation on them in letter and spirit.

About the other agenda of privatisation, the PMA leaders showed utter displeasure and resentment saying that Punjab Health Secretary Ali Jan allegedly misled Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz by presenting flawed policies.

They said the outsourcing of radiology and pathology departments of the government hospitals to private parties across Punjab would be disastrous for the state-run health facilities.

The PMA leaders strongly rejected the policy and announced that they would go to the extreme level to resist the controversial move, suggesting to the CM Punjab to take the relevant stakeholders including the doctors/medical community into confidence.

They also opposed the government’s decision to hire the doctors on ‘daily wages’, declaring it the funny and frivolous idea.

Those who addressed the convention included Dr Ghulam Shabbir, Prof Ashraf Nizami and Dr Shahid Malik from PMA, PAFP President Dr Tariq Mian and YDA Punjab President Dr Shoib Niazi.

Published in Dawn, July 25th, 2024