Bhubaneswar: Health services in Odisha affected due to contractual nurses’ strike. Due to strike by near about 2,000 nurses working in the three medical college hospitals and other Government hospitals, services in hospitals were badly affected.

Demanding regularisation of services and hike in salary, members of the All Odisha Contractual Nurses Association (AOCNA) ceased work from Sunday throughout the State and sat in dharna before the SCB Medical College and Hospital at Cuttack, the MKCG Medical College and Hospital in Brahmapur, the VSS Medical College and Hospital in Burla and other Government-run hospitals, protesting Government inaction over their demands.

Association president Gangadhar Panigrahy and other leaders Shivani Das, Smita Mohapatra and Basanti Behera said here in a Press release on Saturday that in case the Government did not solve the problems by July 16 evening, contractual nurses from all over the State would converge in the State capital on July 17 and sit on dharna in front of the State Secretariat. If this attempt failed to impress the Government authorities, the nurses would be forced to gherao the Health Minister and the Chief Minister’s residences, they threatened.