HUNDREDS OF doctors in Pakistan’s largest city are in hiding or fleeing the country to escape a wave of extortion and murder specifically targeting the medical community.
Healthcare in Karachi is under siege according to doctors’ leaders as terrified medics close their clinics and go underground as they wait to emigrate.
The crime wave is exacerbating a medical “brain drain” to Europe, the United States and the Gulf which has already seen 2,800 doctors seek employment overseas in the past 12 months.
Gangsters are particularly singling out GPs who are seen as well known, wealthy targets with little security and regular, predictable movements.
Victims first receive extortion demands of up to €9,000. If they do not pay quickly, bullets are sent through the post as a warning of what awaits.
At least nine doctors have been shot dead in the port city in the past nine months. Hitmen riding pillion on motorcycles have shot dead doctors in traffic or burst into their clinics to execute them.
“Doctors are on the run,” said Dr Idrees Adhi, president of the Pakistan Medical Association’s (PMA) Karachi branch.
“They have stopped opening their clinics . . . It’s a horrible state of affairs,” he said. “Those who do continue to practice, including myself, are sitting ducks.”
Sectarian violence between the city’s Sunnis and Shias has added to the crisis. Doctors are seen as symbolic targets because of their social standing within the rival communities.
Dr Adhi said extortion victims are reluctant to contact the police and often close their practices immediately without telling anyone, making it difficult to judge the scale of the departures.
“I think there are hundreds in hiding. They don’t give their numbers to police because they cannot provide protection,” he said.
Police have set up a hotline for threatened doctors and have caught several suspects, but struggled to mount cases.
“No one will come and recognise them in court and no one will testify against them,” he said.
“The crooks who have been caught say doctors are an easy target and by killing one, you can send a message out to the others.”
Dr Imran Wasi became the most recent victim when he was shot dead on January 20th.
Two men on a motorcycle shot dead the 55-year-old ear, nose and throat specialist as he drove to his clinic. Police said it was still unclear if his death was due to extortion or sectarian violence.
Landhi and Malir districts of the city are particularly hard hit by extortionists, said Dr Atif Haffiz, of the Pakistan Islamic Medical Association.
“These extortionists all know where their children go or work and it’s very easy to target a doctor because they have fixed timings opening their surgeries,” he said.
Pakistan’s Medical and Dental Council has issued 2,800 “good standing certificates” to the country’s doctors in the past year, according to Dr Samrina Hashmi, former general secretary of the PMA, in a sign of the scale of the professional emigration.
Foreign employers require the certificates from Pakistani doctors seeking work abroad. Saudi Arabia has become the choice destination because of its safety and high salaries, she said.
“Most of the young doctors are leaving the country because they don’t feel safe. Maybe in the next two or three years we won’t have anyone to treat the patients.”
“The police are trying their best. They have given us a number to call for an immediate response, but the police force is small for such a big city.”