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Medical Services across the State on Saturday badly hit as doctors went underground fearing arrest with the Orissa Government invoking Essential Services Maintenance Act ahead of their indefinite strike from Sunday.
After the invocation of ESMA, police have started manhunt campaign to nab the fleeing doctors.
Patients under going treatment at SCB Medical College and Hospital in Cuttack, VSS Medical College in Sambalpur and MKCG Medical College and Hospital in Berhampur have started vacating their beds and preparing for them to private hospitals due to shortage of doctors.
“We have referred as many as 20 seriously ill patients to SCB Medical College Hospital at Cuttack,” admitted capital hospital chief medical officer Umakant Mishra. As a majority of doctors did not turn up for duty today in view of ESMA the patients were discharged, he said.
'We have decided to go on strike from Sunday as the government did not fulfil any of our demands,' Orissa Medical Service Association President Madhusudan Mishra said.
Doctors across the state were aggrieved as the government invoked ESMA by which the police could arrest the medicos without warrant, he said.
While OMSA demanded immediate lifting of ESMA and fulfilment of their demands, including withdrawal of dismissal order on three medicos on charge of chopping palms of three Kalinganagar victims during post-mortem, the government remained adamant on its stand.
'The government will not lift ESMA until OMSA withdraws its strike plan,' said a senior health department official. The Health and Family Welfare Department Minister Sanatan Bisi, who failed to convince the agitating doctors last night, told reporters that the government was making alternative arrangements to provide health care at hospitals.
