IMA says almost 2 lakh private doctors in Maharashtra have been excluded from Centre's Covid vaccine plan
Doctors in Maharashtra have accused the state government of discrimination and written to the central government over "non-inclusion" of allegedly more than 2 lakh private doctors and healthcare workers in the list of frontline workers eligible to get the first Covid vaccine.
The Indian Medical Association (IMA) has written a letter to the Prime Minister, Union Health Minister, the Chief Minister and state health minister to look into the matter of "utter injustice".
The letter comes amid indications that India may have a coronavirus vaccine by early next year. The central government has ordered states to draw a list of "all private and government healthcare workers" at the forefront of the battle against the coronavirus pandemic in the country, which has almost 83 lakh cases.
The letter blames the state health secretary for excluding private doctors in Maharashtra - country's worst-hit state with almost 17 lakh Covid cases - from the list even though "the central government plans to vaccinate all health workers on a priority basis".
"Health Secretary changed the guidelines sent by the centre... the words "registered with the district" were introduced... directed that doctors and medical staff of hospitals registered under Bombay Nursing Home Act should be registered. This led to exclusion of doctors from privately run hospitals, clinics, pathology labs," the letter signed by IMA state president Dr Avinash Bhondwe reads.
Besides government doctors, private medical professionals have also played a key role in treating Covid patients, the letter adds escalating the ongoing war with the Maharashtra government over state's refusal to extend the centre's posthumously insurance cover of Rs 50 lakh - Corona Kavach - to 61 medical professionals who died in the line of duty.
The circular by the state Health Secretary, which was sent to all district collectors, municipal commissioners and divisional commissioners, has also been criticised by the Association of Medical Consultants and the Dharavi Ayush Doctors' Association.
"Private doctors helped the Mumbai municipal body, BMC, in screening and testing people at a time when no one was willing to even enter Dharavi (Asia's largest slum)," Dr Akhtar Sheikh, General Secretary of the Dharavi Ayush Doctors' Association, said.
The Indian Medical Association has been raising its voice for better treatment of doctors amid the pandemic. It issued a list of doctors who died in the line of duty after Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan did not mention the deaths of healthcare workers due to COVID-19 in his Parliament address, and his junior minister admitted the government was not maintaining this data. Recently, the IMA also started a fund to support families of doctors who died because of the pandemic, and wrote a sharply worded letter over non-payment of salary to doctors in Delhi's Hindu Rao Hospital.