KUALA LUMPUR, April 4 — The group calling itself Mogok Doktor Malaysia (Malaysian Doctors on Strike) appears to have deactivated its main social media account today, one day before its planned three-day strike was set to end.
A check of the group’s Instagram account, which had over 15,000 followers prior to deactivation, showed that it was inaccessible at 7pm.
This had been the group’s sole means of conveying information on purported discrimination against contract doctors in Malaysia and the three-day strike at public hospitals and health clinics across the country.
Yesterday, the group, through a spokesman who chose to remain anonymous, deemed the first day of the supposed contract doctors’ strike a “success”, even as public healthcare facilities and the media reported that there had been no service disruptions.
The group reportedly insisted this was because medical officers had been forced to step in when some contract doctors had taken leave in support of the action.
Last week, Mogok Doktor Malaysia claimed that 8,000 contract doctors were not expected to attend work starting April 3, and that this would severely affect certain hospitals’ emergency departments and labour rooms.
The hospitals named were HKL, Serdang Hospital, Hospital Sultanah Aminah Johor Baru, Sultanah Fatimah Specialist Hospital in Muar, Melaka Hospital, Hospital Raja Permaisuri Bainun in Ipoh, Hospital Sultanah Bahiyah in Alor Setar, Penang General Hospital and Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Kota Kinabalu.
The group demanded the absorption of all contract medical officers into permanent positions, basic salary increments, higher on-call rates, and an automatic reduction in the compulsory service term for medical officers to three years.
It also called for a reduction in on-call and work hours for medical officers and house officers, and for specialist shortages to be addressed.
