Dakar, April 20 (APS) – The Collective of health and social action workers (CTSAS) announced on Wednesday that it wanted to observe a twenty-four-hour “general strike” on Thursday April 21.
“We are decreeing, for this Thursday, April 21, 2022, a twenty-four hour strike throughout the territory”, declared, during a press conference, in Dakar, the secretary general of the Autonomous Union of Doctors of Senegal. (SAMES) and CTSAS spokesperson, Amadou Yéri Camara.
Despite the strike, health professionals will take care of medical emergencies and provide “minimum service”, he said.
The CTSAS says it wants to observe this strike because of the “lack of fairness” of the public authorities to the detriment of its members and the legal proceedings brought once morest midwives at the Amadou-Sakhir-Mbaye hospital in Louga (north), following death in childbirth of a patient.
“We ask the agents of the various unions to work hand in hand to fight once morest the lack of equity (…) of the State to the detriment of health workers,” said Amadou Yéri Camara.
The CTSAS brings together SAMES, the Union of Health Workers, the Autonomous Union of Health, the Union of Local Government Health Workers, the National Association of State Midwives of Senegal and other organizations unions.
The Collective of Health Workers plans to continue the strike beyond the duration indicated.
“The duration of the fight will depend on the (…) treatment of this Astou Sokhna affair and that of our protest platforms by the State of Senegal. We will fight for [le respect de] our rights, our dignity and the respect of our noble profession”, argued Mr. Camara.
“Instead of carrying out impartial investigations and taking precautionary measures, the authorities are rushing to hold health personnel guilty of negligence,” he added.
“It’s a way of fanning the fire and frightening the health personnel, who might become fragile”, denounced Amadou Yéri Camara.
He maintains that “the prosecution has just committed a (…) forfeiture by placing four of the six accused midwives under arrest warrant, two of whom are pregnant and one suffering from heart disease”.
Four midwives from the Amadou-Sakhir-Mbaye hospital were placed under a warrant of detention on Tuesday for failure to assist a person in danger, following the death which occurred on April 1, in this public health establishment, d ‘Astou Sokhna.
They will be tried on April 27 before the Louga flagrante delicto court, along with two other midwives charged but released, according to one of their lawyers, Abou Abdoul Daff.
Astou Sokhna’s husband accuses health workers at the Amadou-Sakhir-Mbaye hospital of non-assistance and negligence towards his wife.
After nine months of pregnancy, his wife was admitted to the maternity ward of this hospital on March 31, where she died in childbirth several hours later.
On April 13, the director of the Amadou-Sakhir-Mbaye hospital, Amadou Guèye Diouf, was relieved of his duties and replaced by Abdallah Guèye, a hospital administrator.
Cheikh Seck, secretary general of the Democratic Union of Health and Social Action Workers, says that the CTSAS “is following the situation in Louga very closely and gives its full support to the intersyndicale” of workers in the health.
“This first national plan will be followed by others (…), until fair treatment is obtained for our comrades”, he warned during the press conference.
“We believe that it is unfair to dedicate an entire socio-professional category to loathing”, continued Mr. Seck, denouncing “the media lynching” of which health professionals would be the object following the death in childbirth of Astou. Sokhna.