Video Editors: Vivek Gupta, Sandeep Suman
Voice Over: Athar Rather
Doctors and medical staff have been at the forefront in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. In India, around 800 doctors have lost their lives in the second wave alone. But despite serving people with selflessness, medical professionals are regularly assaulted and abused in the country. Many of them work with job insecurities, and practise amid tragic conditions.
Vulnerable to Physical Violence
Reports of doctors being beaten up by kin of patients have become increasingly common in India. On 1 June, Dr Seuj Kumar Senapati, posted at a COVID Care Centre (CCC) in Udali in Assam’s Hojai district, was brutally beaten and thrashed by utensils and brooms by a mob that included the family members of a deceased patient. An on-duty woman doctor was assaulted by the relative of a COVID patient in Ballari, Karnataka on 23 May. There are countless similar incidents from across the country.
Besides being under constant fear of…