Female doctors urge nation to stay at home amid coronavirus

KARACHI: A group of female doctors, affiliated with different medical facilities, have urged the people of Pakistan to stay at home in a bid to contain the outbreak of coronavirus.

Addressing a press conference in Karachi today (Friday), the female doctors appealed to the government to ensure enforcement of lockdown.

They warned the masses against coming out unnecessarily from their homes during the coronavirus pandemic. They also said that the pressure on doctors would [decrease] if people listened and stayed home.

Dr Nusrat Shah, a gynecologist, has informed that they were receiving pregnant patients every day who were seriously ill. “Coronavirus threatens both the mother and the child. The patients that we receive, we try to save them but we are unable to,” she said.

She also informed that the doctors were being affected by the coronavirus pandemic. In this regard, she said, “We need to save doctors’ lives. If doctors start dying, who will save the patients?”

Dr Nusrat Shah also criticized the government for not doing their work and said, “The doctors are forced to do the government’s job because the government is not doing it.”

“The doctors will not be able to work on treatments and developing vaccines if the concerned authorities fail to ensure the implementation of the precautionary measures,” she added.

Dr Nusrat Shah also said that the country’s health system wasn’t able to cope with the increasing coronavirus cases.

She also advised businessmen to keep their businesses closed. Citing the example of China, she said China had managed to control the spread of the disease by enforcing an effective lockdown.

Another doctor present at the press conference asserted that 80 percent capacity in the hospitals of Karachi has been filled due to coronavirus patients.

She also said, “We don’t have enough beds in our intensive care units, we do not have enough ventilators. We have started awareness campaigns on how to protect ourselves.”

“If we don’t take precautions, we will suffer. We don’t know how many of our patients in gynecology wards have viruses. We don’t have testing kits. I appeal to the entire Pakistani nation to stay at home,” she concluded.