Clicky
Editorial

Doctors left unprotected at private hospitals

Hospital authorities cannot deny their responsibility


Bangladeshpost
Published : 28 Apr 2020 08:46 PM | Updated : 06 Sep 2020 06:02 AM

At this stage when many frontline doctors and medical professionals are contracting coronavirus every day, it is discouraging to learn that more than one third of doctors at private hospitals have still not been provided with any personal protective equipment (PPE)

It is the duty of the hospital authorities to supply those safety gear to all they employ. Any failure to do so throw the physicians and other patients in those hospitals in grave danger.

It needs no emphasizing that safety measures taken for medical professionals working on the frontline to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic is still not up to mark and which us why the number of infected medical workers increasing at an alarming rate in Bangladesh. Reportedly, at least two health workers in the country have died so far while 88 more are infected by the deadly virus.


It is the duty of the hospital 

authorities  to supply those 

safety gear to all they employ


We are told that hundreds of crores of taka is being spent to brought PPE but not a single consignment meets the criteria of the World Health Organization. No doubt without proper and adequate PPE, our workforce will be dicimated.   Who will then be left to look after the patients.

When medical staff don’t have the proper protective gear, they put not only themselves at risk but other patients as well.  The longer this epidemic goes on for, if doctors feel that there is a widespread lack of PPE, then some doctors may feel they have no choice but to give up the profession they love, because they feel so abandoned by not being given the PPE that the World Health Organization recommends. 

That’s the travesty of this situation, that the government needs to protect frontline health workers and in return they will give their best. We must integrate adequate security measures for medical workers who are directly confronting the virus.