Where have all the Nightingales and Hippocrates gone?

Where have all the Nightingales and Hippocrates gone? Not a single day passes without letters to the editor appearing in the local press highlighting devastating and heartrending news, and news reports in the daily papers about the disgraceful behaviour of the doctors and nurses.

What noble professions these are. I cannot imagine why these doctors and nurses behave like terrorists and murderers. After all they reached prestigious positions using public funds. They are people who reaped the benefits of the free education system thanks to Dr. C.W.W. Kannangara.

The most recent heart breaking incident was the strike by the nurses and doctors at Ratnapura Hospital causing the deaths of six patients including one child and three infants. How heartless, malicious and malevolent these nurses are? Have they got hearts of stone to lock up the cupboards and drawers containing drugs and essential medical equipment? Aren’t they hypocrites? Aren’t they murderers to have struck work and held the lives of poor patients to ransom just over the transfer of a male nurse? The irony of all this is that a Buddhist priest who should be humane and benevolent is at the helm of the nurses’ union.

The Minister of Health seems to have made an announcement that he has already ordered an inquiry into this matter and also has decided to ban strikes in the health sector, which I think will never see the light of day.

He will appear on TV and make statements to newspapers. But these will only be political utterances just to get away from the prevailing situation. This is not the first time that the doctors and nurses have held the poor patients to ransom. This should stop!

Please Mr. Minister of Health, save the poor patients who cannot afford to go to private hospitals where they would have to pay through their noses. Their only saviour is the General Hospital. I do hope that acts of this disgraceful nature will not become a regular feature in the long run.

Dear doctors and nurses, please look after the poor patients of Sri Lanka and you will earn merit by doing so.

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