Placing Blame for the Doctors’ and Pharmacists’ Strike

                                                      A clinic in rural Nkwanta District.

To continue with the same theme as my last post, I’d like to discuss the current doctors’ and pharmacists’ strike.  Ghana is going on almost two weeks with no functioning physicians or pharmacies in the public hospitals—the primary healthcare providers in the nation.  This, for obvious reasons, is a very stressing circumstance for our citizens who rely on these institutions in times of emergency, as well as for day-to-day health concerns.  It is they who are undoubtedly suffering most from this strike.  And I wonder if either party, the government or the doctors, are truly concerned about this suffering.  And if they aren’t, than that is the true travesty.

There are definitely grounds for incriminating the government, much of which revolves around the single-spine salary structure that was implemented under Atta Mills.  I make this point objectively with no interest in aligning myself to any political party in Ghana.  This system was supposedly designed and implemented to create greater salary equality in the country.  It was proposed with a number of grand promises to make a more comfortable livelihood for all workers and to fix all of the salary issues faced by public servants in the past.  Such lofty promises require as much follow through, and that is where the government has failed in the first place.  As evidenced by this strike and the recent teachers’ strike, these promises have not been fulfilled.  In the second place, the government failed to shed light on both sides of the story.  They never publicly acknowledged that, while such a system would lead to salary increases for some public servants; it would simultaneously lead to salary decreases for other public servants.  For the purposes of this discussion, these other public servants are the doctors and pharmacists who expressed disinterest in being a part of the single-spine system from the outset.  Lastly, these decreases often come as a shock to the workers who don’t even realize they are going into effect until they receive their paychecks.  Those implementing the single-spine system sit down with the various labor groups (i.e. teachers, doctors, pharmacists, police officers, etc.) to enter into negotiations.  Both seem to walk away happy from these negotiations; but just a few months later, when the paychecks are received, we find ourselves in situations like the current strike.

Given the government’s actions, it’s understandable why the doctor’s would be frustrated.  However, I can’t help but wonder if their greatest concerns are not actually about their pay, but about the pay of their counterparts in other fields.  Those who stand to benefit most from this single-spine system are those who were formally paid least, which may be why we haven’t seen public servants in the police force, for example, moved to strike.  While their salaries are still smaller than the salaries of doctor’s, the margin between the two has definitely diminished.  I believe this may be root of the doctors’ frustration.  They have expressed concern since the introduction of the single-spine system about being paid similarly to those who may have failed out of school at the junior or senior high level (but who still qualify for the police force)—afraid that their hard work was being overlooked.  They have also used terms like “essential service” to describe their work as something unique and more valuable than the work of other public servants.  While they may be making some strong points, I don’t know that this perspective is justifiable.  Is it right to favor certain public servants over others?  Aren’t all positions necessary for our society to function?  The arguments become a little less clear under this light, and it becomes difficult to place blame.  In the meantime, it is our people who will pay the consequence.