Bengal doctors observe National Black Day against state act

Sporting black badges, hundreds of doctors here on Thursday observed National Black Day in protest against the West Bengal Clinical Establishment Act.

Demanding a repeal of the law, they claimed the Act and repeated attacks on doctors and health professionals, are being "engineered to cover up to the gross inadequacies and series of anti-people pro-corporate policies that have converged into National Health Policy 2017 (NHP 2017)".

"Hence only united democratic movement can really uphold the citizens' voice. We still have a long way to go, and it's the responsibility of all stakeholders to keep up to it," said a joint statement issued by Medical Service Centre, Service Doctors' Forum and Junior Doctors' Unity.

The protest was called by the Indian Medical Association which recently gave the go-ahead for legal action challenging the law.

Around 10 branches of the IMA in the state have moved the Supreme Court against the law, said IMA's south Kolkata chapter's chief R.D. Dubey, who accused the state government of not paying heed to their demands for amendments in the law, forcing them to move the court.

"We want the law to be scrapped and issuance of a revised draft with changes that we have demanded. We are not against the Act but against certain clauses, which are harmful to medical practice. A fear has developed among the people regarding private health establishments. Doctors are refusing to accept medical cases due to fear of punitive action under the law," he said.

Dubey demanded that government hospitals should also be brought under the Act's ambit.

On March 3, the Bengal assembly passed the tough bill to regulate the functioning of private health facilities, providing up to three-year jail and trial for culpable homicide and a maximum fine of Rs 50 lakh in case of patient deaths due to severe medical negligence.

The legislation, aimed at bringing transparency, ending harassment of patients and checking medical negligence in private hospitals and nursing homes, brings under its ambit all other private medical set-ups -- irrespective of whether they are registered or not.

Pursuant to the law, a high-powered 13-member regulatory commission has been set up to monitor activities of private hospitals.

--IANS

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