Adelanwa Bamgboye and Abdulhakeem F. Akinola
6 January 2009
There was total compliance of strike yesterday in Lagos State by members of the Medical Guild after the expiration of 21 day ultimatum given to the state government to tackle issues described as sacrosanct to their effective ser-vice at the state owned hospi-tals.
Monitoring of the strike across the Lagos metropolis showed that health services in the state owned hospitals were yesterday grounded as the striking medical practitioners stormed public hospitals to stop recalcitrant members on duty to make the strike effective.
At the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja, our correspondents observed that activities there were paralyzed due to total compliance by the house officers while only a few consultants were seen atten-ding to patients in critical condi-tions.
Also at the Massey Children Hospital on Lagos Island, our correspondents gathered that the strike had started as early as 6am.
At the General Hospital on Marina Lagos Island, newsmen were told by the medical director, Dr. Hameed Balogun that members of the Medical Guild stormed the hospital at about 9am and held the medical doctors on duty and beat them.
Consequently, Dr. Balogun disclosed that when he saw the threatening situation, he sought the security assistance of the policemen at Lion Building Police station who immediately rose to the occasion by detailing policemen that eventually beefed up the security of the area.
At the Massey Street Chil-dren Hospital in Lagos Island, the Medical Director, Dr. Akan-de and a handful of senior medi-cal personnel were seen atten-ding mainly to emergency cases.
Our reporter found out that some patients on admission were forcefully discharged while new patients and those on appointments were turned back without being given further appointment for further medical attention.
Meanwhile, the state government yesterday rose to the challenge as it immediately detailed some medical personnel to the public hospitals. "The state government had sent doctors to the hospitals to take charge," the Public Relations Officer Ministry of Health, Tubosun Ogunbanwo, said.
Ogunbanwo expressed the state government's gratitude to those medical personnel that ignored the call for industrial action, describing them as patriotic who actually held the tenets of medicine and the oath of the profession which is to always save lives at all time.
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