Moroccan female doctors continue protest against remote assignments
2008-11-10
Female doctors in Morocco are protesting a change in policy that allows them to be assigned to jobs far away from their families. The health ministry says there is no solution on the horizon.
By Sarah Touahri for Magharebia in Rabat – 10/11/08
 [Sarah Touahri] Morocco's female doctors reject having to choose between work and family. |
Female doctors newly assigned to work in remote areas of Morocco as part of a new regionalisation strategy refuse to return to work, despite a protracted showdown with the health ministry. The women, who study for up to 14 years after high school, do not want to be forced to choose between their job and having a family.
Under a previous rule, young female graduates who were married were guaranteed assignments within 65 miles of their homes. This rule is no longer being applied, leaving young doctors to depend on a random draw that takes no account of personal family situation.
A representative of the health ministry's communications department told Magharebia there is no solution on the horizon; it has suspended the women's salaries from November onwards. A number of sit-ins held outside the ministry to protest the remote assignments have had no effect.
Nephrologist Maha Benjelloun, who is one of 101 specialists included in the protest, told Magharebia that they have already received their wages for October and that they will have to wait until the end of this month to see whether the Ministry of Health will indeed carry out its threat.
No matter what the ministry does, she said, her fellows are not prepared to give in and sacrifice their family lives. "We'll go on campaigning even if they stop our wages; we have no choice."
Dr. Benjelloun lives in Casablanca but was assigned to work in Oujda, 440 miles from her home. She has two children, a nine-year-old son and a three-year-old daughter, and already spent five years working in an outlying district 20 miles from Khouribga. She is not prepared to be moved away from her family again, she said.
Her story is rather like that of Nadia El Attar, a specialist in internal medicine who was already separated from her husband and children in Oujda when studying in Rabat. She was then assigned to work in Laayoune, 1,250 miles from her marital home.
"I know I have a duty to care for my patients, but I also have a duty to be a mother to my two daughters: Manar, who's four, and Nour, who's four months," she said with tears in her eyes.
The Ministry of Health says it is essential to provide access to healthcare throughout Morocco, eliminating gaps in coverage. For this reason, the ministry claims, being female is not a reason to turn down a job in a rural area.
Health Minister Yasmina Baddou has said that women doctors are able to exercise their right to transfer after one year's practice, adding that in addition to the right to be moved after one year, they also obtain the benefits of two to three years' service. The minister revealed that 50 married female doctors from the 2007 class have returned to their jobs in outlying towns.
The group of protesters says these were married women who were able, by virtue of the draw, to obtain jobs within 65 miles of their homes if they were not assigned to the towns where their husbands worked.
"Some have husbands whose jobs enabled them to be with their wives in the locations to which they were assigned," said one demonstrator. "A very small number were obliged to move away from their husbands and children for purely financial reasons, out of fear that their wages would be stopped – those with mortgages to pay, for example. Most of them have been badly mentally affected and are depressed."
The protesters have criticised the so-called "twinship" criterion. Three of the protesting women have been reassigned on the grounds that they are the mothers of twins aged under 18 months.
Email to a friend
Print version
Mohamed Posted 2008-11-11
The day that we allow our religion to guide us in all domains is the day that we will be certain to resolve all of our problems. And, I will be knocking on the doors of this country’s leaders first!
صالح مجدول القاديري Posted 2008-11-11
Separating a married doctor from her kids for work in order to fill vacancies in very remote hospitals without taking into consideration the life of the doctor towards her kids and husband, is not a wise decision. The moral stability of the individual and providing a propitious environment encourages the doctor or any other person to work in good moral conditions and give excellent results. But separating the doctor from her family is an unfair decision with all standards. Therefore, the ministry of health should annul this unsuccessful move which it has adopted. The doctor is a human being first, before being a doctor. She has the right to have a normal and quiet life. In my humble opinion, there are military specialist doctors who can replace her if there is a shortage or sent specialist doctors graduate of the school of medicine, who are bachelors and look for a job immediately after graduation. Have mercy on married doctors, don’t throw them in remote regions far from their kids. Where are the associations for the protection of women? I don’t think that the respectable minister can move her office hundreds of kilometres away from her husband, but how does she accept it for other women?
turquish Posted 2008-11-11
Being a doctor myself, I think that the married female doctors are egoistical and devoid of any patriotism or love for their profession. They put shame to the Hippocratic Oath. I take my hat off in honour of and respect for those who have taken to their post: a big “Bravo!” to them!
محمد Posted 2008-11-11
Refusing to work in Moroccan regions is an odd attitude and contrary to building the nation. All the sons of Morocco need medical care in all the regions. Everyone should act to contribute for the service of the nation. Stating children as a pretext is illogical. The husband and children should move to the place where the doctor is assigned. Enough of centralization in big cities not to serve the citizen but to deplete his pockets, work in private clinics and profit from the monthly salary without offering a service for that. To say it in local dialect, these are just caprices.
acharif moulay abdellah bouskraoui Posted 2008-11-14
Morocco needs all the doctors it can get to make up for their lack in the remote areas. Therefore, I call upon all the female doctors to accept making a sacrifice for the good of the country for at least one month. Enough already of taking advantage of the government’s tolerance!
M Posted 2008-11-14
I am a regular citizen, both concerned by the national media’s story and trying to understand things. First, how did the Minister of Health define the needs of the remote regions? Second, given that most doctors need a sophisticated medical environment, how can we ask them to practice their profession in unfavourable conditions? Third, is it normal that a doctor who is working in a large urban centre be paid the same as a doctor working in the remote regions, that is: giving them no compensation? Fourth, given that specialised doctors are scarce, how can the state afford to lose them to the other countries that welcome them and their families with arms wide open and the best working conditions? We should avoid partisan politicking on the shoulders of our highly qualified human resources and begin a real national debate on the best means to bring our health care system up to par.
أبو طه Posted 2008-11-18
This ministry witnessed after the appointment of this minister from Al Istiqlal party a chaos in nominations including officers of the minister. This shows a hatred against officers who do not belong to this party which became a family grouping of the families of Badou and El Fassi and those who turn in their sphere. So when are we going to rely on competence instead of party membership which doesn’t serve public interest?
ayoub Posted 2008-11-21
These doctors have studied for 14 years and their studies are very very difficult and very exhausting, involving a lot of responsibilities, a lot of time to study and not very much time for their families after the bac. Do they not deserve to live like someone with a real family?
derfouf Posted 2008-11-22
You Moroccan women doctors and specialists are, at the very least, organised and claiming your rights. We Algerian specialists do not have this unity. Personally, I am pediatrician and I have been married for three years. I have been without work for three years because I was assigned to a position faraway from my children between 2005 and 2008. In 2008, I took a position 250 kilometres away from my home, offering no housing such that I was forced to commute 500 kilometres everyday. The question to ask our “protectors” is if it would be more just to address this issue in order to satisfy both the patients and specialists.
urgent: votre solidarité svp Posted 2008-12-02
(http://www.lejournaldetanger.com/ar/images/visuels/couv/jdt.pdf) Hello- Click on the above link, then select the Arab version of the newspaper and go to the front page. You will learn of the story of two female friends, one of whom is a doctor, who were peacefully going about their morning jog in the district of Tangiers called Rmilat when four delinquents accosted them and savagely gang-raped them. From this article, which you will read at the above link – perhaps written in Arabic only so that it goes unheard? – nothing was done or said. The city’s so-called “doctors” are, for the most part, a bunch of crook and their union did not even take the initiative to organise a small protest in support of their sisters!!! These are women who work with them, who could have been their daughters, their sisters, their wives! The result is that these women are now in a dreadful psychological state, currently residing in a clinic in Rabat where they suffer from complete indifference in silence. This message is addressed to all the Moroccan women who are fighting for the rights of women, to all the women in the world, to all the doctors in the world and to all the men, the real men, please, make sure that these two women know that there are still human beings who support them through this tragedy. This is about the future of their family and professional psychological health. It is up to you! –Thank you
asmaa Posted 2008-12-06
On the one hand, it is clear that Morocco needs specialists, but, on the other, it is also clear that it cannot assign them to remote corners and give them a bottle of aspiring to treat people. Certainly, ignorance may blind people, but you cannot oblige doctors to do this dirty job. I am a female doctor and I have been sent to a remote corner. I had to quit my job in order to do this and my children are with my mother because there are no private schools here. What right do they have to privilege another woman who comes after me given that she too is a woman?
امال Posted 2008-12-14
I think that the endurance talked about by doctors assigned to remote areas does not exist except in their imagination. This is because they are used to the life of luxury close to their families. Assignment in remote areas is not a justification to stop work. If they have a child or two, why don’t they think of hundreds of kids, women and even men who need medical care? Those who think of private schools, why don’t they think of the kid who can’t find a doctor? So what of a private school? Medicine is a humanitarian profession before it is … respectable doctors don’t want to relinquish anything children… but they are ready to relinquish their duty towards their patients.
Medecin et fier de l'etre Posted 2008-12-23
Well said, Amal! Know that I and several of my compatriots are absolutely against these papa’s girls, who have nothing to do with the real Moroccan doctors and only represent themselves and their education. They are egoistic, cowardly, unpatriotic, remissive and, above all else, they have no sense of duty or sacrifice. The mission of a true doctor is to heal, listen, soothe, give hope and help the weak and the poor live, sharing their pain wherever they may be. Believe me, my dear Amal and all of my compatriots, te don't even own a chewing gum the true Moroccan doctors. Even so, all the Moroccans should be alarmed, because the core of our (alas!) society is now giving a poor example. These women should serve as examples for the future generations, not as examples of egoism and betrayal of the Hippocratic oath.
wydad Posted 2008-12-30
What the minister did to these poor doctors is insane. The truth is that there are regions with a shortage of doctors, but this does not give the leaders the right to deprive doctors of their family lives!!! We need to find a solution for them as soon as possible.
wadid11 Posted 2009-02-02
Stay strong, Madame Minister. You must not yield to these women, who are unworthy of their missions. All Moroccans need the same quality of health care, especially those in the remotest regions.
halima Posted 2009-05-01
If there is one lesson to take from this, it is that every female bac graduate needs to think it over 1000 times before deciding to go into medicine. They need to be aware that they are going to sacrifice 14 years to studying and, more importantly, not get married before being assigned a post at age 32 or older.
Integrity_plz Posted 2009-05-24
I sympathize with both sides actually. My first reaction was to condemn the doctors as selfish and unpatriotic, but I don't have all the facts and I am sure not all the female protesters are in the same situation. So, I will give the doctors the benefit of the doubt and assume that their plea of family hardship is legitimate. What the government can and should do in this situation, however, is to make it attractive for doctors to want to go by paying them an extra %25 for example or whatever to make it competitive. The government should try to make possible for the husband to leave his job if he so chooses and take care of the kids himself even. It's completely reasonable, and that's how the world works. You have to make it worthwhile for people or at least show some appreciation for the effort. Yes, it would be nice if these doctors are all "heroes" and are willing to sacrifice their families and personal lives for the country, but that's not always realistic when you want to ensure the success of an ambitious strategy such as providing equal access to health care for all Moroccans; which by the way is an excellent idea and I am for it all the way. To give an example, the US military pays its personnel what is called "Hazard pay" or "Hazardous duty pay" depending on location and the hardship and danger involved; and it works. Soldiers are happy to do it. Nobody questions the patriotism of the military for example, but can you imagine if the government did not provide the extra pay, the free food, and the moral support we hear on TV? Another issue is that people want their work to make a difference. They want to know that their sacrifice will not be in vain. It's up to the government to reassure them that this will be the case. Good luck to all.
We welcome your comments on Magharebia's articles.
It is our hope that you will use this forum to interact with other readers across the Maghreb. In order to keep this experience interesting, we ask you to follow the rules outlined in the comments policy. By submitting comments, you are consenting to these rules. While Magharebia.com encourages discussion on all subjects, including sensitive ones, the comments posted are solely the views of those submitting them. Magharebia.com does not necessarily endorse or agree with the ideas, views, or opinions voiced in these comments. This is a moderated forum. Comments deemed abusive, offensive, or those containing profanity may not be published.
Magharebia's Comments Policy