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From Lateef Dada, Osogbo
The Association of Resident Doctors (ARD) and the National Association of Nigerian Nurses and Midwives (NANNM) of the Obafemi Awolowo Teaching Hospital Complex (OAUTHC), have engaged in a superiority fight, accusation and counter-accusation over disposal of waste.
The disagreement between the two health officers had led to the threat to embark on strike and abandon unsuspecting patients to their destiny.
A statement signed and made available to our correspondent by the president, Dr Nana Fayowole and the Secretary of ARD, OAUTHC, Dr Anuforo Anthony, on Wednesday, alleged that there has been recurrent harassment of Doctors in the hospital.
According to the statement, the crisis broke on Thursday 16th of June, 2022, when a female doctor “was forcefully held hostage, confined and verbally assaulted while discharging her duty, by a Senior Nurse in the Female Adult Orthopedic ward (FAOW).”
The statement alleged that one house officer was asked to discard the waste used and when she didn’t answer, the matron locked the gate with the padlock.
“As if that wasn’t enough, she started shouting and rained a lot of insults on her to the extent that nurses from other wards came to plead with her to stop and open the gate but she refused. One of the other nurses even offered to bring her attendant to come and help with the waste but she declined,” the statement alleged.
Because of this, the ARD declared a 48-hour warning strike starting from 8 am on Tuesday, 21st June 2022 to 7:59 am on Thursday, 23rd June 2022, and issued a four-week ultimatum for the hospital management to investigate and also come up with a document detailing the job description of all clinical staff.
However, the NANNM has described the strike embarked upon by the ARS as ‘unwarranted’, accusing them of supporting professional malpractice and breach of hazardous waste disposal.
A statement signed and made available to our correspondent by the Chairman, Comrade Ajayi O. O. and the Secretary of NANNM OAUTHC, Oyeniyi O. L., explained that the nurse on duty asked the doctors to pack the sharps used by them during the procedure and they refused, hence the disagreement.
“The nurse’s action is in line with the WHO standard of healthcare waste management and that of Basel convention on the control of the transboundary movement of hazardous wastes and their disposal UNEP 1992 which was flouted by the doctors who left the sharps exposed.
“It is however disheartening that the ARD did not exhaust all available administrative measures to resolve the issue before going to the media to threaten to embark on a warning strike not minding the consequences of their actions on the health of the innocent citizens.”
The NANNM called on the appropriate authority to carry out a thorough investigation into what it described as “politically motivated grievance, those who are determined to destroy our peaceful co-existence in the institution.”
