THE RIGHT TO LIFE

What should you do if a district GP refuses to issue a medical certificate about the state of your toddler's health? You will need one in order to apply at the registration department at your place of domicile for a birth certificate. Interestingly, the reason the doctor gave in this instance was that the child had not received any scheduled inoculations and therefore a medical certificate could not be issued. To which the parents replied that they had the right for inoculations to be done at a private clinic and even to choose a time that was convenient for them. And to obtain a certificate one has to stick to a timeframe - within 30 days of the birth of the child. If there is a delay there is a fine of AZN 10. And no-one can be insured against a child catching a cold: even a child with a slight cold cannot be given an inoculation. However, the doctor (the incident occurred with one of this magazine's readers - author's note) categorically stuck to her guns, claiming that a child's health certificate could not be issued without an inoculation at the outpatients' clinic.

In this instance there was absolutely nothing logical in the doctor's actions. What was the point of insisting that the child have inoculations if the parents intended to approach a private clinic to do this? It would appear that level-headed people don't have a choice of going through the procedure to vaccinate their child or not, and the doctor's extremely dubious concern over this was inappropriate and suggested she had certain ideas of her own. Moreover, a GP should on no account create obstacles about issuing a child's health certificate if the birth certificate has to be obtained within 30 days.

The child had twice been examined by this doctor, the first occasion being called to the house ten days after the child had been discharged from the maternity home, and on the second occasion the parents brought the child to the clinic. Nevertheless the district GP twice stubbornly refused to issue a certificate, insisting that it could only be issued after inoculations. A complaint to the clinic's chief surgeon to try to reason with the imperturbable doctor was also to no avail. She confidently maintained that the chief surgeon would say exactly the same because these rules operate throughout Azerbaijan. The parents, who were already late in obtaining a certificate, could do nothing but leave because they did not want the clinic to inoculate the child. Incidentally, before arguing their case, the heroes of this conflict should have found out on whose side the truth lay. And so the child's parents decided to approach the editors of R+.

The registration department of Baku's Nariman District at the Justice Ministry (this incident occurred at a clinic in Nariman District - author's note) said that in order to obtain a birth certificate one has to apply to the registration department for the place of domicile and present the following documents: a certificate from the maternity home, copies of both parents' identity cards, copies of the parents' birth certificates and a copy of the report of the doctor's opinion.

The State Customs Office makes no provision for the issuing of a birth certificate but the documents to obtain one must be presented within 30 days of the birth of the child. If you are unable to make these arrangements in the allotted time a fine of AZN 10 is imposed.

The aforementioned documents must include a child's health certificate from the out-patients clinic in the district of registration. But it is not obligatory to indicate which inoculations a child has been given in that time because the first and second scheduled inoculations of an infant are made at the maternity home.   Subsequent inoculations are arranged when the child reaches two months. This has nothing to do with the time allotted for obtaining the birth certificate. This was reaffirmed for us at the press service of the Health Ministry which stressed that the doctor who insists that a health certificate cannot be issued to a child without inoculations is perpetrating an illegal act. At the ministry the parents were advised to go back to this doctor and ring the department's "hot line" on (012) 495-40-15, pointing out the identity of the doctor who had abused her official position.

This is what the parents did, but they approached the Health Ministry before their latest "trek" to the out-patients' hospital. The department promised to "sort it out" and when the child's mother again went to the clinic the district GP graciously told her that the child would have to be brought in for an examination in order for a health certificate to be prescribed. That was how the problem was resolved.

Other parents would not be bothered to take such a long and tedious route to deal with such a problem but would try to resolve it in the ordinary way. In this instance one must give these people their due for not allowing the doctor to infringe their rights in such a coarse manner. In previous issues of this magazine I have more than once addressed the problem of what the ordinary citizen should do to protect their rights, urging them not to do the bidding of those who infringe them. Protect your rights and approach the appropriate authorities but do so in a proper manner!