Anguished over stressed work environment, Govt doctors in Kerala to boycott additional duties
Kerala: The government doctors of Kerala lead by the Kerala Government Medical Officers Association (KGMOA) have boycotted all additional duties, protesting against the government's alleged lack of concern for healthcare workers, and failure to implement any of the proposals put forward by the association to support health workers who have been working tirelessly for the past nine months.
According to one of the press releases by the association, the demands of the association includes addressing the shortage of human resources immediately, restoring leaves which were reasonably received after continuous COVID duty, establishing a block basis call center comprising of retired doctors and private doctors to provide treatment to those under home supervision, prompting disbursement of deferred salary, reinstatement of leave surrender benefit and assurance that health workers will no longer have salary deferment, providing risk allowance and incentive to health workers who are overworked in hazardous conditions.
The association further added that having to provide 24 hours service by just one or two doctors can adversely affect the health of the staff as well as patient care. The doctors who administer treatments are literally mentally and physically exhausted. This overwork is a major factor in the hundreds of health workers who become ill every day, including doctors.
The association alleged that instead of recruiting new doctors, the government is pressurizing the doctors to work more and are not considering the plight of healthcare workers who are overworked and fatigued. It found that it is unfortunate that instead of providing psychological support to employees, including doctors, there may be measures that discourage them.
