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Chief Justice of India N V Ramana on Thursday said the government not giving priority to the medical sector and its problems such as insufficient number of professionals and infrastructure are 'issues of immediate concern' as he lamented that doctors are brutally attacked on duty for someone else's failure.
Addressing the medical fraternity on Doctors' Day and launching the 'Defeat Diabetes Campaign', the CJI said there was a need to start an awareness movement like the anti-tobacco and pulse polio campaigns and the state has to step in in a big way.
"It is saddening that our doctors are being brutally attacked while on duty. Why is it that the medical professionals are at the receiving end for someone else's failure? Issues such as insufficient number of medical professionals, infrastructure, medicines, outdated technologies, and government not giving priority to the medical sector are issues of immediate concern," he said.
He said the people can sincerely greet the doctors on July 1 only when the medical bodies and government agencies concerned put their heads together to address these concerns.
Justice Ramana said doctors are attacked while on duty and asked why profiteering by corporates and investors is being blamed on doctors.
Praising doctors for their services, he called them 'living gods and goddesses' and 'heroes without the cape' and paid tribute to the healthcare professionals who lost their lives during the COVID-19 pandemic.
"The Indian Medical Association's data suggests that more than 798 doctors have lost their lives in the deadly second wave. My heartfelt prayers and sympathies go out to the families of those medical professionals and healthcare workers who have lost their lives to the COVID-19 pandemic," he said.
While the world is still reeling under the devastating impact of the pandemic, doctors have been tirelessly and selflessly fighting against the deadly pandemic, the CJI said.
In the speech, the CJI rued that doctors struggle to get decent salaries even after eight to nine years of rigorous learning and fail to start a decent hospital of their own and survive.
The CJI also put forth moving thoughts penned by one Lizzy, a young medical professional from the United States, which stated, "Watching you suffer is destroying my heart, We healthcare workers are falling apart."
"When I get dressed for work, it's not just a job, when I lose another patient, it's in my car that I sob. You see I am human, I bleed just like you, and with each death that I witness, a part of me dies too," he quoted Lizzy as saying.
He was addressing the medical fraternity on National Doctors' Day at the launch of the Defeat Diabetes Campaign initiated by the Research Society for the Study of Diabetes (RSSDI).
Doctors' Day is observed in honour of noted doctor and former West Bengal chief minister Bidhan Chandra Roy, whose birth and death anniversaries fall on July 1.