RAWALPINDI, Jan 22: Young doctors protest on Thursday brought healthcare services in the three government hospitals here to a standstill.

They were protesting the arrests of their colleagues in Lahore and ‘zero-tolerance’ of Punjab government.

The rally organised by Young Doctors Association (YDA) Rawalpindi chapter was participated by the doctors of District Headquarters (DHQ) Hospital, Holy Family Hospital and Benazir Bhutto Hospital.

The protest was led by Young Doctors Association Chief Coordinator Dr Sherin M. K. Yousafzai.

They were chanting slogans against Chief Minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif and police.

The angry doctors gathered at the lawn of BBH and closed outdoor patient departments (OPDs). However, the hospital administration appealed to the doctors to let patients come to the hospital.

Addressing on the occasion, Mr Yousafzai condemned the Punjab government for losing patience adding that if students could protest in Islamabad and block road for seven hours, then why the peaceful doctors were being harassed.

He said the doctors’ community was shocked over the unjustified action of the Punjab government of beating doctors for pre-empting the strike call given by YDA for demanding their legitimate rights.

He said that the young doctors would continue to press for their demands and rejected the provincial government’s decision of banning training facility at Punjab government hospitals to foreign and private medical graduates.

“Where would the foreign and private medical graduates go if they are denied training facilities in government hospitals across Punjab?

This rule is no where applied in the country,” he added. The doctors demanded the Punjab government to immediately repeal ‘black laws’ for doctors and threatened to launch province-wide protests in case their problems were not addressed at the earliest.