JJ hosp resident doctors 'protest', but get only cloth masks

MUMBAI: Resident doctors working at the outpatients' department of J J Hospital, which tends exclusively to swine flu suspects, are having to work without N95 masks. It was only on Thursday, seven days after the OPD started, that they were given cloth masks after they staged a noisy protest at the offices of the hospital dean and superintendent. Doctors, however, say these masks are not effective at all at shutting out the H1N1 virus.
But doctors working at the other OPDs have not got any mask at all and have expressed fears that they may be exposed to the virus when they treat other patients."Many patients who come to the other OPDs show symptoms of flu as well. What is there to protect us if some of them are actually carrying the virus and pass it on to us?'' a resident doctor, working with the ENT department, asked.
The Maharastra Association of Resident Doctors (MARD) has got into the act. "We come in close contact with people who may be carrying the H1N1 virus. Not having masks makes us vulnerable to catching the virus,'' MARD president Rahul Paddawad said. "And we are not bothered only with our personal well-being. What happens if a doctor catches the flu and then passes it on to patients? Not providing OPD doctors with masks puts patients at risk as well,'' he added.
"We recorded the first positive case at JJ on August 6 and asked the authorities to provide all resident doctors with masks. But our demands went unheeded. They have decided to provide only the swine flu OPD doctors with single- or double-layered masks a week later but we are yet to get the N95 masks,'' Paddawad added.
Hospital officials, however, said they were doing everything they could to provide doctors with masks. "Whatever is possible is being done. We have made provisions for the doctors. They are provided with Tamiflu tablets as well as masks. We care as much about the health of our doctors as anybody. We have given the OPD wards around 250 masks (not N95),'' hospital superintendent H H Jadhav said. He, however, admitted that the supply of N95 masks was running low and the every effort was being made to supply these masks as soon as possible.