Local people, stakeholders and staff of Holling Bery Syed Moazzem Red Crescent Hospital yesterday formed a human chain and held a rally in front of Ashwini Kumar Hall in the city demanding immediate resumption of medical services at the hospital by solving management problems.
Dr ANM Enayet Karim, chief executive officer of the hospital, Dr Habibur Rahman, health rights activists, Ebaidul Haque Chan, president of district BNP addressed the programme among others.
The speakers said the hospital was built with contribution from businessman Syed Moazzem and was inaugurated on February 5 last year. The fifty-bed, four-storey hospital was a key healthcare service provider for people belonging to low-income group in the northern part of the city.
However, since October 2013, Moazzem has stopped providing funding because of disputes over the management and service charges.
Most of the doctors have left the hospital early this year while other employees have been without salaries since December 2013 and are in financial hardship, speakers said.
Participants of the human chain demanded immediate resumption of medical services by clearing overdue payment and ensuring regularisation of service facilities for the hospital staff.
At a meeting on July 7, 2012, Governing Committee of the hospital decided to raise service charges in order to bear the minimum management expenditure without making any profit.
Some locals, however, protested the move and funding was suspended in the wake of that, said Moazzem, also the executive chairman of the Governing Committee.
Iqbal Hossain Forkan, acting president of Red Crescent Barisal unit, said construction of the four-storey building, installation of modern medical equipment and some other tasks demand big funding which could not be borne by the Red Crescent alone.
