Doctors threaten to stop conducting pregnancy ultrasound tests

They say amendments to regulate radiologists under the prohibition of sex determination Act irrational

Published on:

20 Jul 2012, 5:08 am

Radiologists across India are contemplating a nation-wide strike on August 1 to demand rollback of amendments introduced in the sex determination prohibition Act. The amendments to the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Technique (prohibition of sex selection) or PCPNDT Act of 1996 were published by the Ubion health ministry in the gazette notification on June 4. The amendments are meant to make the law more stringent.

The restrictive amendments

The Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Technique (prohibition of sex selection) or PCPNDT Act now limits the movement of medical practitioners qualified to conduct ultrasound to only two sonography centres within a district.

This means the doctors can now be registered only at two such centres. Earlier, there was no restriction on the number of hospitals or sonography centres a sonographer or a radiologist could visit.

The Act has also increased the fee to start a sonography centre and assigns fixed working hours of a doctor at the sonography clinics

Doctors' strike