Nigerian doctors embark on strike, as coronavirus cases exceed 16,000, over 400 deaths

The Association of Resident Doctors(ARD) on Monday commenced  a nationwide strike as coronavirus continues to ravage the country, and this was hours after coronavirus cases exceeded 16,000 with over 400 deaths.

Penpushing reports that the President of the association, Dr Roland Aigboyo made this known, and did not give further details as at the time of filing this report, but the union had earlier complained of salary irregularities and shortfalls to the migration to the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS)

The Doctors before now, had on the day the country recorded its third case of coronavirus in mid March, threatened to embark on the strike action but later called it off after the Nigerian Medical Association(NMA) advised them against it.

Penpushing also reports that, as at the time of filing this report, it was not clear if their  demands in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory(FCT) are synonymous with that of others across the nation.

The Minister of Health, Osagie Ehanire, while reacting to the development expressed fear that the strike may lead to loss of more lives, but the Doctors in a communiqué issued at the end of its virtual extraordinary National Executive Council Meeting, noted the non-payment of allowances and inadequate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) as part of reasons for embarking on the industrial action.

Penpushing further reports that, the worried Minister while responding to questions at the daily Presidential Task Force on coronavirus briefing on Monday urged the Doctors to show empathy by calling off the strike.

“Today we had a meeting with the House Committee Chairman on Health. NARD were also in attendance. At that meeting, they had not yet declared their position on the strike. I also did request that this is not the time to go on strike; not when we have a very difficult situation on our hands’.

“I requested them to show enough empathy to know that we will continue to work on their demand and they should not down their tools because the lives that may be lost in that process are not replaceable,” he said.

“But we are very certain that the issues that were raised will be attended to, even though some of them are not very new and some of them date back to few years ago. Some of them have nothing to do with COVID-19, but have to do with residency training programmes. They are all being attended to. There are series of demands and some of them are not current,” he said.