"The horror that took place in Pljevlja is the ultimate appeal for the competent institutions"

The wounding of neuropsychiatrist Ilhan Tursumović in the Pljeval hospital while he was doing his job is another case of worrying statistics of attacks on medical workers at all levels of health care in Montenegro, the Association of General/Family Medicine Doctors announced.

"This horror that took place today in Pljevlja is the ultimate appeal for the competent institutions and the Government to introduce into the Criminal Code as a separate criminal offense an attack on persons who perform healthcare activities. As a reminder, during the current year more than 11 percent of doctors were exposed to physical attacks , let's not talk about verbal violence, because it, unfortunately, has become everyday. According to earlier research, 79 percent of doctors in health centers experienced verbal attacks, and 95 percent of doctors in emergency medical services," the announcement states.

They appealed to the Government to reconsider the initiative to amend the Criminal Code of Montenegro and enable such attacks on medical personnel to be criminally prosecuted.

From that association, they said that it is more than evident that the medical staff is completely unprotected and that tensions take up an increasing part of a medical worker's working day, whether he works in a health center, an emergency room or a hospital.

"As a reminder, this summer, in less than ten days, there were two attacks on medical workers in the emergency department in Nikšić. At the end of June, a doctor was physically attacked in the health center in Podgorica... The problems of professional burnout and stress of health workers are completely marginalized. What perspective do young people have? doctors who start working and how employees after a working day filled with insults and attacks to return home to their families, and tomorrow again to the same working atmosphere," the announcement states.

"The position of doctors and medical workers in society must be strengthened in the legal sense if we think that we will move forward as a society. We give our colleague Tursumović our full support and hope for his speedy recovery. Doctors are united in their demands to be protected in this system so that they can professionally they are doing their job," the statement concluded.