PATIENTS TURNED AWAY AS DOCTORS BEGIN NATIONWIDE STRIKE

Scores of patients are being turned away as doctors across the country begin a nationwide strike. The doctors are embarking on the strike to protest the failure their employer, the government, to provide them with conditions of service. According to them, they have had to work for several years without a document that determines their welfare. Apart from a two-week mortuary fees a doctor is entitled to when he or she dies, the doctors say there is nothing that indicates how they will be treated if they or a family member falls sick. A July 29 deadline given government to provide them with a document on their conditions of service or face mass resignations expired yesterday. A meeting held between the doctors and the Ghana Medical Association (GMA), Wednesday ended in a deadlock. After almost four hours of negotiation, the representatives of the GMA said there were unresolved issues in the proposal they submitted to government for their conditions of service. They have since dec...