MANILA – The Health Alliance for Democracy (HEAD) on Saturday reported the killing of the provincial health officer of Dinagat Island, Dr. Vicente Soco, the latest in the recent string of murders of doctors.
Dr. Soco was shot by a gunman on a motorcycle while at the family’s gas station in the evening of Thursday, September 14.
“The Department of Health is just as responsible for the deaths of our doctors by refusing to implement stringent measures to protect them,” HEAD secretary-general Dr. Joseph Carabeo said in a statement.
Soco is the sixth doctor to be killed this year, after Dreyfuss Perlas of Lanao del Norte, Jaja Sinolinding of Cotabato, George Repique of Cavite were shot earlier.
The Department of Health also reported the death of a doctor from ARMM, while a doctor from Tarlac was also killed.
All these remain unresolved.
“This is part of the effect of the culture of impunity that prevails. Human rights, human lives, seem to be of little value under the Duterte regime,” said Carabeo.
He took the Department of Health to task, and said, “the DOH should make a firm and unequivocal stand regarding the protection of all health workers, especially those working at the frontlines. Until now, the DOH has yet to set up mechanisms to assist frontline health workers experiencing harassment. They have no clear position as to whether they will protect and seek justice for their health worker.”
Carabeo added that the DOH Secretary’s statements of condemnation are useless, “and as the bodies of these doctors pile up, for as long as no one is held accountable, these statements insult the families and patients of the victims”.