Frontline workers in Myanmar’s health crisis vow to keep up pressure on the regime

Frontline workers in Myanmar’s health crisis vow to keep up pressure on the regime

Fearing a return to the disastrous policies of the past, medical professionals have taken the lead in the fight against military rule

Doctors march in Yangon on February 22 as part of the nationwide general strike to demand an end to military rule. (Myanmar Now)

“Doctor Soe” was alone in his room on the afternoon of February 15 when police attempted to raid the housing compound for doctors at the Sao San Htun hospital in Taunggyi. He saw about 30 officers coming towards his room. He quickly locked the door and hid inside the bathroom, terrified.

Keeping perfectly still, he listened as they banged on the door for several minutes. Apart from the sound of his heartbeat, there was complete silence in the room. The banging seemed to get louder and louder.

After about 10 minutes, the police left.

“It was the first time the police came for us. Previously, they were just patrolling around the hospital,” Doctor Soe told Myanmar Now.

 

 

That night, Doctor Soe and other doctors at the hospital left the compound and went into hiding.

The 28-year-old is one of over 100 doctors and nurses at the hospital who have been on strike since the military seized power on February 1.

 

 

According to Thiha, another doctor who works at the hospital, no operations have been performed there since nearly the entire medical staff, except for the hospital’s superintendent and deputy, stopped going to work.

Doctors said they didn’t know who the authorities wanted to arrest that day, but they seemed to be targeting one specific person, as the police didn’t knock on the doors of any of the other doctors’ rooms.

They are among thousands of civil servants in Myanmar who chose to go on walkout rather than work under the country’s new dictatorship. This growing civil disobedience movement aims at toppling the regime’s government mechanism.

Abandoning government hospitals

At least one doctor who joined the movement has been arrested, while many others around the country have been intimidated by police or pressured by their superiors to return to work.

A few others, including Prof Zaw Wai Soe, the vice chair of Yangon’s Covid-19 task force and rector of the University of Medicine (1) Yangon, have been charged with incitement for supporting the movement.

Doctors and other healthcare workers were among the first in Myanmar to join the nationwide movement to resist the return to military rule.

They have also been at the forefront of the country’s battle against Covid-19 since the deadly pandemic struck last year. Praised as heroes for risking their own lives to treat Covid-19 patients, they are now seen as champions of a very different fight.

“We were so exhausted all last year. At the start of 2021, we were hopeful because people were going to start receiving Covid-19 vaccines and we wouldn’t have to fear the pandemic anymore,” said May Yamone, a 31-year-old general practitioner.

“The military coup has ruined all our hopes,” she said.

Since the military takeover, the same healthcare workers who were on the frontline of the country’s health crisis have been blasted by the ruling military council for “abandoning” their patients.

May Yamone said the authorities and those who call doctors “unethical” for going on strike are hypocrites, because the generals are the ones who have failed to uphold their real responsibilities.

“We have no reason to work under a military dictatorship that tries to govern the country, because that is not the military’s job,” she said.

“If the military returns to where it belongs and performs its own duty, which is defending the country, we doctors will also go back to our places.”

May Yamone said that only doctors can truly understand how hard it is for them to leave their jobs, but added that initiating the civil disobedience movement was “essential” for the future of the country.

The doctors who joined the movement left the hospital facilities that are now controlled by the military with the purpose of defying the military’s orders, not because they don’t want to work, said 29-year-old Aung Thu, who used to work at Yangon General Hospital.

“We abandoned the government hospitals, not our patients,” he said, adding that they are coordinating with other medical practitioners to ensure that their patients continue to receive treatment.

No turning back

Nearly 12,000 health workers, including May Yamone and Aung Thu, joined the nationwide general strike on Monday to demand that the military regime restore power to Myanmar’s elected civilian government.

Millions of protesters came out into the streets across the country, from the northern mountain towns of Chin state to the coastal regions of Tanintharyi. The movement that started on Monday has been dubbed the “five twos” general strike because of the date, 22.2.2021.

Doctors who have joined the movement say they fear that a return to military rule could do irreparable harm to Myanmar’s public health sector.

While the past five years could not completely undo the damage of decades of military mismanagement, they say that the civilian government led by Aung San Suu Kyi had made some headway in improving the country’s long-neglected public health sector.

“During the old days, people were urged not to go to public hospitals. But the NLD government was able to change that situation. We can’t go back to the previous situation,” said a doctor who used to work at a township hospital in Mandalay.

Another doctor from a 300-bed hospital in Mandalay said that that Myanmar could not afford to have another dictatorship.

“We can’t accept another one. We can’t serve the junta, either,” he told Myanmar Now.

According to data from the website cdm2021.com, more than half of the 22,597 civil servants who have joined the civil disobedience movement across the country are from the public health sector.

Doctors who have joined the movement said they will continue fighting until the country’s elected government is allowed to take office.

Vowing never to kneel down to the regime, they insist that the civil disobedience movement is the only weapon that can succeed against the military’s might.

“We will resist until the very end. The military can’t force us to return to work by pointing guns at us,” said Thiha.

Three teenagers among six killed by regime’s forces in Myingyan on Monday 

Police and soldiers shot at rescue vehicles and the houses of residents who tried to save injured people during the crackdown, witnesses said 

Myanmar Now
Published on Mar 16, 2021
Twenty-year-old Yadanar Htoon was killed during the March 15 crackdown in Myingyan (Supplied)

The coup regime’s forces murdered three teenage boys as they attacked anti-military protesters in the town of Myingyan in Mandalay region on Monday, a doctor and residents said. 

Yan Myo Aung, 16, Aung Myo Zaw, 17, and Tun Ye Naing, 18, were among six people killed in the town and at least 20 fatalities nationwide that day. The other victims from Myingyan were Hla Soe, 53, Yadanar Htoon, 20, and Kyaw Saw, 26. 

Three of the six were confirmed dead on Monday afternoon and another one passed away in the evening at a makeshift outdoors clinic, where doctors on strike from government hospitals were attending to wounded protesters. 

Two more were added to the list of fatalities later in the evening, when the junta’s forces told their family members to come and retrieve the bodies from the Myingyan Hospital. 

“I think two injured people that the military had taken to the hospital died on the spot,” a doctor told Myanmar Now. “One was shot in the head and another one was shot in the left side of the chest. I think the soldiers took the bullets out [of their bodies].”

Myingyan Hospital had been closed because medical staff there joined the Civil Disobedience Movement but it has now been taken over by police and soldiers, the doctor added. 

Just four nurses and one military doctor are working at the hospital, and no patients go there anymore because the entrance is guarded by armed forces, the doctor added. 

At least another 17 people were injured in Monday’s crackdown in Myingyan, and five of those are in critical conditions, said another doctor. 

Yan Myo Aung, the 16-year-old who died, had just finished high school last year and was living with his mother, residents said. 

His mother had been unable to stop him from participating in anti-coup protests because he was so passionate about doing so, a resident who went to his funeral told Myanmar Now.

Aung Myo Zaw had finished 10th grade and was looking forward to the Covid-19 pandemic ending and schools reopening. He was the youngest in a family of seven, all of whom have been participating in anti-coup demonstrations, a relative said.  

Tun Ye Naing was one of the breadwinners in his family and worked delivering cheroots - traditional cigarettes - to local traders, one of his neighbours said.

A protester who was with him at Monday’s rally said he had heard from others who witnessed the killing that a member of the junta’s forces hit Tun Ye Naing’s head against a wall after he was shot and told him he was hard to kill before dragging him away.

“I don’t know if it’s true but there was a blood stain on the wall,” the protester said. “We didn’t see exactly what happened because we were running. We only saw that he was taken away on a truck.”

He was brought to the Myingyan Hospital and his family members retrieved his body at around 7:30pm with the help of charity organizations.

Yadanar Htoon, the 20-year-old victim, is survived by a 3-year-old son and her husband.

Hla Soe, meanwhile, was not participating in the protest when he was killed. He was a vendor and was shot as he tried to close the window of his shop after hearing gunshots, a local resident said. 

During the attack, the junta’s forces fired continuously, making it impossible for rescuers and protesters to carry away wounded people. Vehicles being used in the rescue effort were shot at, residents said.  

The junta’s forces also shot at the houses of residents who helped rescue injured protestors. 

According to estimates by the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, at least 183 people have been killed nationwide since the uprising against the coup began. 

The coup regime has also arrested, charged or sentenced more than 2,100 people so far, the association said.  

 

Myanmar Now

Myanmar Now is an independent news service providing free, accurate and unbiased news to the people of Myanmar in Burmese and English.
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UN warns of ‘looming threat’ to Myanmar’s poorest as food and fuel prices spike in wake of coup 

Many in Myanmar may soon be unable to put enough food on the table if trends continue, World Food Programme official says 

Myanmar Now
Published on Mar 16, 2021
Opponents of the coup hold a candlelit vigil in Yangon on February 21 for protesters who have been killed and detained (Myanmar Now)

Rising food and fuel prices pose a “looming threat” to the poorest in Myanmar as the political unrest caused by the February 1 coup begins to affect supply chains, the United Nations has warned. 

The organisation’s World Food Programme (WFP) said on Tuesday that there had been “steep hikes” in the prices of staple goods in northern Rakhine state, with the average cost of cooking oil increasing 27% from January to February.  

The price of pulses in Maungdaw has jumped 15%, while rice prices have spiked by as much as 35% in some townships in Kachin state, such as Bhamo and Putao. Nationwide, rice prices have gone up by an average of 3%, the WFP said. 

And the price of fuel has increased 15% nationwide, which in turn may lead to further food price increases as the cost of transportation balloons. The problem is more severe in northern Rakhine, where petrol prices have jumped by 33% and diesel by 29%.

The WFP collected the data from 250 traders and shops across 70 townships nationwide. 

“These rising food and fuel prices are compounded by the near paralysis of the banking sector, slowdowns in remittances, and widespread limits on cash availability,” the WFP said in a statement. 

The programme’s Myanmar Country Director, Stephen Anderson, said the price increases were “troubling”. 

“Coming on top of the COVID-19 pandemic, if these price trends continue they will severely undermine the ability of the poorest and most vulnerable to put enough food on the family table.”

The WFP is stockpiling food to enable it to keep helping over 360,000 people in Myanmar, most of whom live in displacement camps.

Many parts of Myanmar’s economy have been brought to a standstill by strikes amid a massive popular uprising against the military regime. Foreign trade has virtually halted and banks have been forced to close their branches as employees refuse to work under the dictatorship.  

 

Myanmar Now

Myanmar Now is an independent news service providing free, accurate and unbiased news to the people of Myanmar in Burmese and English.
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Military stops hundreds of Kachin State IDPs from reaching camp

Among the IDPs, currently sheltering in a church in the Myitsone area, are elderly persons and newborn infants. 

Myanmar Now
Published on Mar 16, 2021
A woman holds her baby after fleeing clashes between the Kachin Independence Army and the Myanmar military in Injangyang Township on March 15 (Supplied)

Around 200 civilians fleeing clashes between the Myanmar military and the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) were barred by the junta’s armed forces from entering a camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the Kachin State capital of Myitkyina on Monday.  

Fighting has spread from the Kachin State townships of Hpakant to Mogaung to Injangyang since early March. 

A battle on Monday near the Injangyang villages of Gway Htaung and Tan Baung Yan forced 200 people from both communities to seek temporary refuge in a Catholic church in the village of Tang Hpre. 

Tang Hpre is in the Myitsone area, located on the Mali and N’mai rivers, which make up the confluence of the Irrawaddy River.

“The KIA attacked a [Myanmar] military base in Gway Htaung, Injangyang. The battle lasted from 5:00 p.m. until 8:00 p.m.,” a local source said. “It seems like they [KIA] are trying to regain the bases that they’ve lost in the past.” 

During previous episodes of armed conflict in 2018, the IDPs had previously fled to Pa La Na camp in Myitkyina. Despite continued instability and tension in the region, they had returned to their respective villages in Injangyang during the Covid-19 pandemic to escape the crowded conditions in the IDP camp. 

As they tried to leave the church where they had been sheltering and in order to continue onward to the Pa La Na camp, regime soldiers stopped them, blocking the exit to Tang Hpre village and essentially trapping them in the community. 

Some IDPs crossed the Irrawaddy River in motorboats with the help of locals. Myanmar soldiers told those operating the motorboats to turn back to the Myitsone area with the IDPs by 5:00 p.m. on March 15, according to those who fled. 

“We were told that the Myanmar military has forbidden them from going to Pa La Na camp. They were told to stay where they are,” a local helping the IDPs told Myanmar Now. “They will be assisted with food supplies such as rice, cooking oil, and salt,” the person said, although at the time of reporting, it was not clear who would provide such necessities. 

Among displaced are children, including newborn infants and elderly persons unable to walk.  

Those who managed to arrive in Tang Hpre said more villagers from Tan Baung Yan were still hiding in the forest, unable to reach a safe place to shelter.  

The Myitsone area is the site of a now suspended China-backed hydropower mega-dam which has been widely opposed by the Kachin and Myanmar public

 

 

Myanmar Now

Myanmar Now is an independent news service providing free, accurate and unbiased news to the people of Myanmar in Burmese and English.
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