Patients visiting government health institutions in Sirmaur district are facing serious inconvenience as free diagnostic services have been disrupted. The disruption comes as employees of Krsnaa Diagnostics continue their strike for the fifth day on Wednesday.
The company provides free diagnostic services at government health facilities across the district. The strike has hit free sample collection, laboratory testing and the provision of test reports — services that many patients depend on for their treatment.
Why Krsnaa Diagnostics employees are on strike
The employees went on strike on August 29. The core issue behind the strike is the non-payment of dues by the government. According to available information, Krsnaa Diagnostics has not received payment from the government for around two months.
This delay has affected the company's operations and, more critically, the salary payment to around 200 employees working in Sirmaur. Without regular wages, the staff has decided to stop work until their demands are addressed.
Scale of disruption in Sirmaur district
Krsnaa Diagnostics operates 46 sample collection centres in Sirmaur district, including in the Poanta Sahib area. With all these centres affected by the strike, the impact on patients is widespread.
For many residents, especially those in rural parts of the district, these free diagnostic services are the only affordable way to get lab tests done. The disruption means patients may have to either delay their tests or pay out of pocket at private facilities — an expense many cannot afford.
Our Take: Patients should not pay the price for payment delays
To put it plainly, this is a failure of financial management between a government and its service provider, and the people bearing the brunt are ordinary patients. When a company does not get paid for two months, it cannot pay its staff — that is simple economics. But the result is that free healthcare services, which are meant to help the most vulnerable, are now unavailable.
The government needs to step in urgently. Clearing the pending dues should be the immediate priority so that salaries are paid and services resume. At the same time, there must be a system in place to ensure such disruptions do not happen again — because healthcare is not a service where strikes should ever leave patients stranded.
For now, patients in Sirmaur are left waiting, and every day of delay makes the situation worse. Both sides need to resolve this quickly — the health of hundreds of patients depends on it.