Doctors bare teeth

MEDICAL DOCTORS in the country have bared their teeth to 'bite' the Atta Mills government hard if it fails to urgently address matters relating to their salaries, conditions of service and welfare in general since according to them, their tolerance and patience have run out on almost four-year salary negotiations which they see as crucial to their survival.

They are however keeping closely to their chest 'the degree of venom' they would spit onto Atta Mills' government if further negotiations fail to bear any tangible fruit.

“Salaries of the health sector including doctors have not been reviewed for the past four years, though all other sector workers have had their salaries reviewed annually over the period,” they complained, adding that government's refusal to review doctors' salaries was a clear breach of memorandum of understanding between them, not to talk about the eroding effects of inflation in the country.

The doctors issued the warning yesterday at a press conference when the Ghana Medical Association (GMA) held its national executive council meeting at Koforidua from Friday March 27-Sunday March 29.

Registering their displeasure at the fact that the government had not been sensitive to their plights, the president of GMA, Dr. Emmanuel Adom Winful said it is unacceptable that doctors in the country had no proper conditions of service, a situation which he stressed underpinned most of their industrial unrests.

The president said what had even worsened their plights was the introduction of the single spine salary structure which he said would be unfair to some categories of workers especially doctors.

Dr. Adom Winful said doctors would only accept the single spine salary structure if relativities according to one's qualifications and job description are factored into it.

The doctors averred that they were still very much committed to dialogue over their conditions of service but if the government continued to drag its feet over their welfare and conditions of service, they would advise themselves accordingly.

The president of the association said doctors in the country would continue to leave the country for greener pastures if the government did not recognise their importance in the society, pointing out that a country like the Gambia whose resources were not comparable to that of Ghana was able to attract good doctors with appreciable conditions of service.

The doctors also spoke against the practice of sending fresh doctors to rural communities without allowing them to understudy the more experienced ones in the bigger hospitals for sometime before being sent there since according to them, fresh doctors might not be able to handle some complicated conditions.

He added that even when these new doctors were posted to the rural communities, they were treated like “slaves' with nowhere to lay their heads and their salaries frozen for months before being paid.

“We want the district assemblies and the government to take this up and provide decent accommodations for doctors posted to the rural communities, take care of at least 50% of their salaries and get a car for them to feel more comfortable there,” he pointed.

The president of the association thus called on the government to be more proactive in resolving their problems and never wait until a near-crisis before it made a move, as it had always been the case stressing, “we are in no mood to wait or negotiate ad-infinitum'.

From Thomas Fosu Jnr, Koforidua