Columns

So much is being said in Sri Lanka these days about our medicine men, of their practice and practices, their haps and mishaps that the news has been carried by wind and wave, not to mention technology, to this part of the world too.

It does remind one of a recent report in the local media of Asian hornets that are said to have invaded this pulsating heart of the old empire and are decimating the local bees that even Brexit might have to take a back seat until Scotland Yard launches a ‘sting’ operation to deal with it.
It was bad enough that the natives here have been bristling with anger at being virtually swamped by their European cousins who are being denigrated as “benefit vultures” and fattening themselves on British social welfare.

Doctors think they have a prior claim to the better schools: GMOA members leave the Education Ministry premises after police obtained a court order to remove them

But now for the Brits to hear that aggressive hornets from their once far-flung colonies could possibly wipe out local bees pollinating the flowers they nurture with such tender care unlike patients in some of Sri Lanka’s hospitals, have had their lips moving in apoplectic dissonance.
Not even such disturbing reports of the birds and the bees could kill the interest of Sri Lankans here who are regularly fed with first-hand stories of the goings-on in the medical fraternity brought here by returning members of the community or sent via so-called social media though one sometimes wonders what is so social about it.

Just a couple of days ago I was told of the on-going war of words between some officials of the Government Medical Officers Association — more popularly known by the abbreviation GMOA — and Education Minister Akila Kariyawasam, with the GMOA spokesman threatening to sue the daylights out of the minister.

One recalls that shortly after the change of guard in the Presidential Secretariat and Temple Trees there were so many politicians of varying and changing hues threatening legal action against others that one thought that perhaps the plethora of alleged cases of bribery and corruption would not even reach the perimeter of the court house.

If the briefless among the legal fraternity were salivating at the thought of a sudden boost to their bank balances, their hopes would have suffered deflation because those threats were as empty as the promises of politicians. So one would have to wait and see whether the flexing of muscles and the threatened launch of legal missiles would have the devastating potential of those released by the Great Leader Kim Jong-un.

Meanwhile, it is worth recounting a couple of stories at least about Sri Lanka’s medical world brought to us from the Asian Miracle and the miraculous escapes some have had from sliding into bankruptcy at the sight of their medical bills and miscellaneous expenses. The miracle, of course, is that some of them have managed to survive the heart seizures that followed the sight of their medical bills. It used to be said-and some say it is even truer today than then — that some doctors cure their patients with pills and then kill them with their bills.

One story was told by a person living in London who took a relative along to a Colombo private hospital for treatment. The patient was immediately warded and over a couple of days all sorts of tests carried out, under whose instructions he did not know. Having paid the unbelievably expensive bills he brought copies of the medical reports to London where he showed them to two consultants here. Both had said that half the tests done in Colombo were unnecessary and not related to the patient’s medical complaint.

That is how some private hospitals make their money at the expense of the patients.
Another story comes from a Sri Lankan consultant physician working in a major hospital here. This doctor had passed out of the Medical College in Colombo and worked for several years in Sri Lanka before moving to Britain.

While on holiday in Sri Lanka recently she had taken a relative to a private hospital for a consultation. She was shocked to find when they walked into the consultant’s room there were already two patients there. There was no privacy and the patient the doctor was examining had his medical details revealed before the other patients in the room.

This is the state of medical care in some of the private hospitals where consultants are more concerned with making sure of their fees and as quickly as possible, with cursory concern for the patients. I know of an incident that occurred at a private hospital in Colombo some 40 years or so ago. To repeat that somewhat nauseating story might upset many. Some might not even believe it. This incident was reported on the front page of the Sunday Observer under “Talking Point”. I remember it well because I wrote it and a witness to what happened then lives to this day in Colombo.

The other two incidents mentioned above came to light recently. But the media in Sri Lanka have been replete with observations and commentaries about the unsavoury practices of some of our doctors attached to even state institutions which clearly indicate their propensity to serve mammon rather than man.

If one were to look at the litany of complaints over the years about the practices of some doctors and their preoccupation with wealth at the expense of the people one wonders whatever happened to that Hippocratic Oath which set out among other things the ethical conduct that those in the medical profession is expected to follow.

It may be that unlike in the past that oath has been deposited in the dustbin as newly passed-out medical graduates do not have to take it though morally they should abide by it. Some say that to expect ethical conduct and an adherence to a moral code today from politicians down to some professionals and non-professionals be it the state or private sectors, is like expecting the sun to rise in the west.

Painting all doctors with the same brush would be to carry this too far. There are many responsible and dedicated doctors who put patients before self. One needs to be wary about damning entire professions and groups of people because of the disgraceful conduct of some.

But in recent times we have heard or read of numerous ‘doings’ by individuals that bring their professions or vocations into disrepute. The problem is when a group of professionals act in concert and exert pressure on a government or an institution to concede demands that might be unfair by the rest of the community and is prejudicial to the well-being of people generally.

The current contretemps involving school places for the sons and daughters of government medical doctors is a case in point. If the rules and regulations adopted by the Education Ministry militate against a particular group of persons because they are subject to a different set of rules, then there is obviously a need to rationalise the systems so that nobody is penalised as a result of conflicting regulations.

If the children of doctors do not have schools it is the duty of the state to provide them places at that grade because education is compulsory up to a certain age. The problem here is not a lack of schools to accommodate these children. The problem is over the demand that Grade One level children be provided with places in a select number of schools in Colombo and other principal towns.

If the children of government doctors are to be accommodated in a select number of schools, those in other professions or government sector employment have a right to ask why doctors should be given preferential treatment.

Prime Minister Wickremesinghe was correct when he said that one career path should not be considered more important than another. If the children of doctors get priority in the school placement process, it could well mean that other parents who probably have a better case to make on behalf of their children lose out.

That cannot be allowed to happen because doctors think they have a prior claim to the better schools. The answer of the doctors’ association is to use their profession as a weapon to brow-beat the government and hold the people hostage just as the LTTE before its ultimate demise. The GMOA has been increasingly using its medical role to confront governments on issues that are not directly relevant to its status as a trade union in the medical profession.

The GMOA does not seem to really care that in its selfish pursuit of the best for themselves they are actually hurting the people of Sri Lanka whose tax money went into providing them with a free education that allowed them to become doctors. The more the doctors go on strike causing a disruption in the work they should be doing and their duty to the people, the more the wrath of the people accumulates against them.

From their demands for duty- free cars, probably to travel from their State work- places to their places of private practice, to objecting to a trade deal with India, all the people see is a group of professionals that fatten themselves on the citizenry because self-aggrandizement is their goal.
No wonder then that some wag has termed the GMOA the Government Meddlesome Officers’ Association. Doubtless others have even more appropriate names to describe this agglomeration that has turned Hippocrates into hypocrisy.