patients at the Benin Central Hospital in Benin, the Edo State capital, yesterday urged the federal and state governments not to pay the striking doctors.

Only three patients were seen at the male and female wards of the hospital when our reporter visited there yesterday.

 

A matron, who spoke in confidence, said the wards were usually filled with doctors and patients before the strike started.

 

Some of the patients said they would soon be discharged.

They said the striking doctors should be made to experience similar pains they had been passing through since Tuesday.

 

Mr Friday Iyebe, who had spent two weeks at the hospital, said it was sad that doctors could embark on the strike without considering the plight of their patients.

He said: “This is not the right time for doctors to strike. They are supposed not to be paid for allowing people to die. They should not receive salary for punishing patients.”

 

Another patient waiting to be discharged, Justin Idiaghe, urged the doctors to call off the strike.

She said patients were made to suffer the strike action.

At the maternity ward, it was learnt that six babies had been delivered since the strike started.

 

A source at the hospital said only expectant mothers without complications were allowed into the labour room while others were referred to other hospitals.

The source denied allegations that four babies died at the hospital because of lack of proper medical attention.

 

The hospitals’ Medical Director, Dr. Edith Kayode-Iyase, confirmed that several patients had been discharged.