The Association of General and Private Medical Practitioners of Nigeria has directed all its members nationwide, especially in the Federal Capital Territory to offer free treatment and respond to emergency situations that may rise country according to their professional training.
The association was reacting to the Emab Plaza bomb explosion in Abuja which killed more than 20 persons and wounded over 40 people.
The National President of AGPMN, Dr. Frank Odafen told journalists on Thursday in Abuja that the decision was part its Corporate Social Responsibilities.
He said, "In our country, we are plagued by the scourge of criminality and in emergency situations such as insurgency as witnessed yesterday during the bomb blast. We as private doctors and members of the Association of General and Private Medical Practitioners of Nigeria have deployed our members to respond to emergency situations.
"And as part of our CSR, we have told our members all over the country especially those of us in the FCT, Abuja that any victim of the bomb blast or should be treated free. Any one, including the criminal should be involved in medical emergency. Our treatment has no discrimination; we do not segregate, whether you are an armed robber, whether you are an insurgent or whether you are a victim of their criminality, we treat everybody alike.
"Vocation or our professional oath tells us not to discriminate, irrespective of your religious inclination, social biases, political inclination, sex or gender. We treat everybody alike. But after our treatment and the people are healthy, then the security forces can come in and take care of whoever they want to take care of. But as Doctors, we are not discriminatory in our attention to the wounded, to the injured and to the person that is unwell or ill."
Speaking on the insistence of doctors for the provision of police report for treatment of gunshot patients, Odafen said the law has been relaxed.
He said, "Before now really, Doctors' attention to the injured especially those with gunshot injuries was cumbersome. The law was that you must get the police report before you treat; otherwise you would have been seen to be aiding and abetting criminality or armed robbery. So we as professionals, we as people who are determined to bring health to everybody and anybody. We made passionate appeal to government and they have now relaxed that law.
"Any doctor who fails to treat anybody in emergency is committing a crime. You must treat people, accident victims, you must treat people with injuries but you must be on the watch out. If you suspect that this injury was gotten under suspicious circumstances, you need to report to the police or any arm of the security agency to investigate but your duty is to preserve, to make life more wholesome for anybody, whether a criminal or a victime of crime.
"It is entirely within your domain as a professional because our ethics does not allow us to discriminate. Unarguably, health, the life of our patient must be our first consideration everywhere and at all times and that is what we stand for. That is why all our members are all called upon everywhere to maintain the highest ethical standard in dealing with members of the public, especially in emergency situations."
source: nigerianeye
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