COIMBATORE: Doctor members of the Coimbatore chapter of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) participated in a 24-hour strike from Wednesday 6 am to 6 pm on Wednesday.
The national IMA had called for the strike. Medical students boycotted classes. However, in all hospitals in the textile city, emergency, casualty and intensive care unit (ICU) functioned normally.
The Coimbatore chapter of the IMA led by its president Dr. M. Mariappan, expressed concerns regarding the National Medical Commission (NMC) Bill 2019, which was passed by the Union health minister, on Tuesday. “Section 32 of the NMC Bill provides for licensing of 3.5 lakh unqualified medical persons to practice modern medicine. Furthermore, the term 'Community Health Provider' has been vaguely defined to allow anyone connected with modern medicine to get registered in the NMC and be licensed to practice modern medicine,” he said.
This means that all paramedics and unqualified persons are now eligible to practice modern medicine and allowed to prescribe independently. This, according to him, is creating official quacks.
Another concern raised by the doctors' community in the textile city regarding the bill is that the law now permits private medical colleges to fix fees for 50 percent of the admitted students, which will be detrimental to poor students.
"They may be anybody's children deprived of an opportunity to become a doctor," Dr. Mariappan said. With regards to NEET exam which will be a qualifier for post-graduate selection, the NMC Bill does not specify the number of attempts a candidate will be allowed to make, which is yet another concern.
