More than 350 Serbian doctors signed an open letter to President Aleksandar Vucic demanding the dismissal of the pandemic crisis team and warning that the country is in the midst of a public health disaster.

The doctors, members of the informal group named United Against Covid, also demanded that a new crisis team be formed, as well as an investigation into claims that data on the scope of the pandemic was being kept secret. They also called for an end to what they claimed was an atmosphere of intimidation and politics which inflict damage on the dignity of health care workers.

The signatories said they have a moral and professional obligation to point out how serious the situation is. “Our humane and professional reaction to the reality that health care workers face daily has led to this initiative,” they said in the letter which was sent to both the president and the country’s institutions. 

The letter was signed first by the doctors who launched the initiative, who said there is no formal organizer because the initiative “belongs to all of us”.

They said that the initiative remains open to all doctors in Serbia in an effort to win back public trust.  

“We the undersigned have decided to make a public statement because we see no other solution to the public health catastrophe in our country,” the letter said, adding that the lifting of counter-pandemic measures prior to the parliamentary election held on June 21 resulted in the loss of control over the pandemic which, they said, cannot be justified with any professional motives.

“The confusion over the number of people sick and dead was caused by discrepancies between statistics and expectations, daily experience, and contradictory public statements which have all disrupted the health care system and broken the trust of the public and medical staff in the system,” the letter said.  

Since the beginning of the pandemic earlier this year, Serbia has confirmed 21,253 cases of the novel coronavirus, and the death toll in the country currently stands at 482. Over the last weeks, Serbia has been recording three-digit daily increases in new cases.