Strikes in Healthsector: When Patient Care takes the Backseat

There is an alarming situation in our hospitals in Nigeria and some African countries. The ready use of strike actions by healthcare workers to settle industrial dispute has caused a big dent in public confidence. Strikes have become incessant these days; possibly reflecting a culture of militancy that has bedeviled our society. A closer look at the list of "demands" often reveals some self-centered pursuit. The big picture is often ignored and the patient, the very reason for our hospitals, is betrayed. Lives are lost. This is an ultimate failure by both the healthcare workers concerned and the hospital  management/government. The brazen manner patients are abandoned and the "contract of care" breached is unconscionable and shameful.  
I know a few things about dying and about the dead, and I know it is not simply a cessation of vital signs.

It is much more complex. It is an irreversible phenomenon that changes the lives of many people for ever.

It is a loss to an individual, a family, a community and the nation.It is not merely some statistics. The loss is not addressed by some "tests for statistical significance" because it is already 100% loss to all concerned. The loss of any patient's life is unacceptable and unjustifiable. Unfortunately, here no one is held to account.

It appears the public has been taken for granted and there is some misplaced sense of indispensability often exhibited by healthcare workers. I reckon this is our big loss.

And I think our loss is the gain of "alternative medicine".

Our loss is the gain of medical tourism.

Our loss is the growing loss of public confidence in healthcare workers and in our hospitals.

There is, therefore, urgent need to balance the right of a healthcare worker to agitate for some good working condition with the right of a patient for undeniable healthcare available.