LAHORE: Several young doctors, nurses and paramedics on Wednesday locked the OPD of the Lahore General Hospital and lodged hours-long protest against the administration for not providing adequate health facilities to patients.

Gathering under the banner of the Grand Health Alliance, they forced the patients including women and children to leave the OPD.

Taking to media, the protesters said that the MRI machine had been dysfunctional for the last three weeks as the hospital management paid no heed to get it repaired despite frequent requests.

Principal says meeting called to address issues

They said the OPD and other wards of the hospital were facing acute shortage of medicines while the sitting capacity for patients was insufficient.

The protesters also sought increase in the number of employees for the evening shift and cancellation of transfer orders of those LGH employees whose services were surrendered to the health secretariat over multiple complaints.

The alliance representatives stressed upon the health department and the LGH management to reinstate the suspended employees as they had been cleared in inquiries.

LGH Principal Prof Al-Farid Zafar said the hospital administration has called an `important’ meeting wherein matters raised by the protesters will be taken up.

He said the MRI faced a minor fault and will be operational within a couple of days. He said other issues will be resolved after some meetings with the staff.

Prof Al-Farid expressed his displeasure over the incompetence of some admin officers for not engaging protesters to resolve their issues.

Published in Dawn, October 24th, 2024