Doctors plan mass exit from North Darfur hospital over unmet demands

EL-FASHER – A group of doctors at El Fasher South Hospital, the sole medical facility in El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur State, are planning to leave the state in protest of unfulfilled demands for salary increases and improved working conditions.

Multiple sources close to the state’s ministry of health have told Sudans Post Arabic that “several doctors from various specialties intend to depart El Fasher South Hospital due to the administration’s refusal to implement their requests for salary increases in the surgery department.”

The surgery department, according to the sources, is overseen by Doctors Without Borders (MSF), a French medical organization.

Concerns are mounting that the doctors’ departure from the hospital could trigger a health crisis, as the facility serves a vast population in the state and across the Darfur region.

In a separate development, local government officials in the North Darfur State capital have said that El Fasher Teaching Hospital has been forced to shut down completely due to damage it sustained from recent incidents in which its solar power system was stolen by armed men.

Local officials say that the hospital’s pharmacy and laboratory were also looted during these incidents. They added that ambulances and other hospital vehicles have also been stolen, and the facility has been emptied of both staff and patients.

Local leaders in El Fasher have appealed to philanthropists, residents, and health sector organizations, particularly Doctors Without Borders, the World Health Organization, the Kuwaiti Friends of Patients Association, the Zakat Office, and other partners, to take urgent action to provide essential supplies.

These supplies include medication, intravenous fluids, and the installation of an emergency generator to manage the crisis before the hospital’s health situation deteriorates further.

It is noteworthy that El Fasher Teaching Hospital is the only healthcare facility in the region and provides medical services to over a million residents of El Fasher locality and surrounding areas.