Communication platforms in Egypt were filled with video clips that documented a severe beating by a patient's escort against the medical staff inside Quesna Central Hospital in Menoufia Governorate.
The clips circulated on the communication platforms showed that the medical staff at Quesna Central Hospital were attacked by a patient's escort, as screams were heard and the beatings intensified between both parties using sticks and hands.
This comes as part of a repeated series of attacks on doctors and nurses, amid continuous demands from the Medical Syndicate to protect its cadres while performing their work in hospitals, which prompted an Egyptian parliamentarian to submit a draft penal code for assaulting medical facilities or their workers.
Local media quoted a security source at the Menoufia Security Directorate as saying that the police opened an investigation into the incident, indicating that the investigation team examined the video footage of the incident.
The scenes of the attack on the medical team sparked widespread anger on communication platforms in Egypt, amid calls for the aggressors to be held accountable and for the concerned authorities to intervene to stop the attack on hospitals and medical centers.
I still see a video now of the beating and dragging of nurses in Quesna Central Hospital, and I want to present my immediate resignation.
- Esraa Attia 🦋 (@RN_esraa) December 1, 2022
Activists and bloggers described the scenes as "provocative", considering that these repeated attacks on doctors and nurses push them to emigrate outside the country.
Why are all these people inside with one case, and where is the hospital security?
Each case is supposed to have one or two people with it https://t.co/RhlMiH79wI
- safaa saleh Safaa Saleh (@safa_ss) December 2, 2022
Blogger Nourhan Farid said on her Twitter account, "Oh God, an insulting, provocative, sad and disgusting scene. I have always heard these stories from my sister, which happens with doctors in the hospital from similar situations to me, whether they promise to beat or insult, but the first time I see it with my own eyes." Thus, whoever is safe from punishment seriously misbehaves.”
If these people did not answer and were tried by the law, and in a short time, peace would be upon the world.
I can't stay in my work, whatever it is, and find people who are involved in their interest, even if the matter is not in my hands. I find myself being beaten and it happens as what happened in this video...the dignity of these people must be returned to them as soon as possible https://t.co/tzwhFssOPC
- Fahmy 🇵🇸 (@MoFahmy19) December 2, 2022
The blogger in Deir Abu Khalifa commented, "I swear to God, it's a farce that will make you hate you in the field of medicine and hate you in the country, and push any doctor to review himself a thousand times before completing it in Egypt."
Blogger Abd al-Rahman Ahmed wrote on his Twitter account, "Action must be taken to protect all people. They are supposed to save the lives of your family and that you come and beat them like this. God suffices me, and He is the best disposer of affairs in every one who harms them. Strict action is required against harmful people, so doctors, nurses and the medical sector travel." abroad due to negligence.
Exodus of doctors
Egypt suffers from a severe shortage of doctors, with many of them tending to work in the Arab Gulf countries and Europe. At the end of last February, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi commented on the emigration of many doctors abroad, indicating that the salaries they receive in Egypt do not suit them.
And last April, the Doctors Syndicate warned of the continued reluctance of doctors to work in the government sector, as well as their increasing efforts to emigrate outside Egypt, calling on the Prime Minister and the concerned authorities to intervene to correct mistakes and improve the health system in all its aspects.
In its report, the Medical Syndicate revealed that more than 11,000 doctors have resigned from working in the government sector since 2019, stressing that it had monitored the resignation of about a thousand doctors within 3 months of this year.
Under the title "The Medical Syndicate sounds the alarm," the Syndicate warned of obstacles to the stability of the health system, expressing its hope that this report would be the subject of a study to overcome the difficulties of the health system, including the severe shortage in the number of doctors.