Campaign Supporting Suspended Moroccan Doctor Gains Traction Online

Rabat – An online campaign in support of suspended Moroccan doctor Nazha El Orch has gained significant attention in the past few days.

A medical practitioner at a public hospital in Dakhla, Nazha Al Orch was suspended from her duties after a video emerged of an incident where she spoke directly to Morocco’s Health Minister, Khalid Ait Taleb, exposing a number of issues at her hospital, including mismanagement and the chronic lack of adequate medical supplies.

The wave of online support for Al Orch started on May 4, after the doctor posted on her Facebook account a picture of the order she received from the regional authorities asking her to appear before a disciplinary board for what the document appeared to brand as insubordination.

While the order did not explicitly cite the charges leveled against Al Orch, it mentioned that the doctor was within her right to view the file containing the charges and to hire an attorney.

The hearing is scheduled for Thursday, May 12.

Al Orch reacted to the order with a heartfelt cry for help. The doctor wrote on her Facebook page: “An order to stand before the disciplinary board…

It is now my turn…

It’s time to end my livelihood…

Instead of punishing and pursuing those who deserve it…I find myself faced with a paper. I am speechless.

We were waiting for recognition for the countless sacrifices we made in the line of duty…for the works you’ve all been proud of, but here we are…faced with endless disciplinary boards formed with the speed of lightning for reasons beyond our comprehension.

Thank you Dakhla.”

The post triggered a wave of online support for the doctor and her husband who is also a medical practitioner in the same hospital.

Moroccans took to social media to denounce the decision through the hashtag #نزهة_العرش (Nazha Al Orch).

One social media user wrote in a facebook post: “This doctor saved the life of my baby girl. She performed a c-section on my wife with minimum equipment. She told me that she did not have access to any medical equipment and that should anything happen to my baby, it won’t be her fault given the little to no means available to her.

“She told me this while running to another ward to get supplies, after finishing the operation, she came to me and told me ‘congratulations, your daughter is a warrior.’

“My daughter is five years old now, I remain forever grateful to God and to doctor Nazha Al Orc. Maybe the doctor won’t recall meeting me because they’re plenty of people out there like me who have suffered the same as I did. Solidarity with the doctor.”

The wave of online support went as far as to organize a protest in Dakhla, with ordinary citizens forming in the streets of the city to denounce the “degrading” work conditions medical health professionals work under.

The incident of the doctor speaking with the minister is documented in several videos posted online. One of the videos shows the doctor explaining to Morocco’s health minister the chronic mismanagement at the public hospital in Dakhla.

While on a visit to the hospital, the health minister stopped to greet the hospital’s staff. Nazha Al Orch seized the chance to speak up on behalf of her colleagues and make her voice heard to national health authorities.

“I have been working in this facility for six years now sir, at the time we had no reanimation units, yet we have never transferred a single case, we handle all cases here,” she told the minister.

“We reach out to doctors across all specialties there are here, but unfortunately working conditions remain a challenge as we have no one here to help us,” she lamented in a broken voice. “We face obstacles at every turn, our phone calls are never answered. We wrote thousands of reports that remained unaddressed.”

The doctor told the minister that the medical staff at the public hospital in Dakhla feel that they are geographically isolated as their complaints never reach their destinations.

The minister then asked her to present her demands, at which point the doctor continued to recount the many issues facing medical health practitioners within the hospital.