Doctors Syndicate expects police investigations following general strike

Syndicate confronted with complaints during prosecution interrogation, says Mona Mina

Doctors Syndicate secretary general Mona Mina and syndicate chief Hussein Khairy were informed of 22 pending reports filed against the syndicate when they were called into the general prosecution's office to be interviewed regarding a report filed accusing the police of attacking two doctors.
Both were summoned on Saturday to the General Prosecutor's office regarding the syndicate's contention that police attacked two doctors working in Al-Matariya hospital.
Mina did not provide details regarding the 22 cases filed against the syndicate. "I expect an investigation will be launched about those reports, and I anticipate that this will follow the syndicate assembly voting on our general strike," wrote Mina on her Facebook account.
"Therefore, we need a strong assembly and high voter turnout to preserve our doctors' dignity and to keep the hospitals from turning into battlefields," she added.
East Cairo Prosecution summoned six police officers from Al-Matariya police who are suspected of having assaulted doctors and nurses in Al-Matariya hospital.
Last week two doctors at Al-Matariya hospital alleged that they had been insulted, assaulted, and threatened, as a group of police officers attacked them at the hospital.
In response, the syndicate decided to hold a general assembly, calling all of its members across Egypt, to come to the syndicates' headquarters next Friday to vote on a general strike. Their stand against attacks on medical staff garnered solidarity from other syndicates, public figures, and doctors. Four-hundred-and-fifty people signed an online petition in support of the syndicate's stance.
"This vicious incident depict a scene of police brutality from those who are supposed to protect people," the statement said.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Interior denied the involvement of policemen in an attack against doctors in Benha Teaching Hospital, in an official statement Saturday night.
"A fight took place between a car agency owner and the doctors at the hospital for allegedly not providing adequate medical care for his sick wife," ministry spokesperson Abo Bakr Abdel Karim said.
Three anonymous gunmen attacked the hospital's gynaecology department in the early hours of Saturday, despite a ban on men entering this section. One of the armed men purportedly claimed to be a police officer, according to Doctors Syndicate board member Hani Mehanny.
"One of the three [attackers] tried to drag a doctor out of the operation room while he was operating on a woman who suffered [internal] bleeding," he said in a phone interview with TenTV channel Saturday. "Hospitals are sacred places and should not witness such attacks, especially when it comes to the gynaecology department; no men should be allowed to enter at all."
Two of the doctors sustained concussions in the attack, and the hospital was subsequently closed. The prosecution ascertained the hospital's surveillance video in order to review of footage.
The Pharmacists Syndicate in Qalyubia condemned the attack on doctors, saying: "It saddens us to hear about continuous attacks on doctors, who are supposed to be protected."
It also called on authorities to commence legal procedures to investigate the incident and to prevent further attacks on hospitals, in a statement the Pharmacists Syndicate released Saturday.