The Covid-19 pandemic has brought to the fore that all is not well with the country’s medical staff. A dozen doctors in five states have contacted the highly contagious virus — mainly due to lack of masks, gloves and personal protection equipment (PPE) — and there are many resident doctors and interns who feel they, as the frontline medical soldiers who handle patients every hour, are “sitting ducks”.In Kolkata, young doctors are upset because they have to run fever clinics wearing a plastic raincoat for protection. “We are raring to go and realise that there is a scarcity of PPEs. But if even one of us is infected, it will be a blow to the morale of the healthcare fraternity,” said a doctor who is part of the Covid-19 team at the Medical College Hospital in Kolkata. (Experts say plastic raincoats offer protection against viruses, but should be customised and discarded every 4-5 hours).“Do you send soldiers on the warfront without guns? Then why are you sending doctors to fight this war without proper kits,” said Dr Ravi Ranjan Kumar Raman of Nalanda Medical College and Hospital in Patna.“My parents and sister cry every day when I leave for work. They ask me not to go to the hospital but I can’t skip my responsibilities. Somewhere in my heart, I know that even if I die, it won’t affect the system,” said Dr Raman.Junior doctors at Nalanda believe they are sent to the front line “while senior and experienced doctors are on the back foot”.In Chennai’s private hospitals, resident doctors are “absconding” from work saying their parents don’t want them to report for duty.The central health ministry and state governments had a two-month notice about Covid-19 in the form of the goings-on in China’s Wuhan province where over 3,000 died in three months. Yet, the task of gathering PPEs, special N95 masks and gloves has been sluggish in all states. A central health ministry drew up a wish-list just 10 days ago, stating the country needs 7.25 lakh body overalls, 60 lakh N95 masks and one crore three-ply facemasks.The fear of contracting the virus is so high that NMCH Junior Doctors’ Association wrote to the Bihar principal secretary (health) on March 25, asking senior doctors from other government medical colleges and private hospitals be put on duty while junior doctors be kept as “reserved manpower”. Bihar has 11 COVID-19 patients at present.They alleged their principal had quarantined himself in his home and has ignored their demands. “All Covid-19 positive people are in NMCH, still we do not have hazmat suit and mask. Instead, we have been given normal gown worn in operation theatre. Our principal has also stopped coming now for his safety and has left us to die,” said another junior doctor.In Mumbai, the former president of Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors Kalyani Dongre wrote to chief minister Uddhav Thackeray about resident doctors forced to wear single-use three-ply mask for three to four days. “If a doctor doesn’t have protection, how can she or he protect others?” asked a Mumbai doctor.The PPE shortage is compounded by the shortage of manpower, again resulting in student doctors being forced to put in extra hours. Holidays have been cancelled for all doctors, including residents who are required to work 24-hour shifts once or twice a week.In Tamil Nadu, the directorate of medical education has asked deans of medical colleges to extend the one-year internship of MBBS students by another month so that they can help out in tackling the Covid-19 crisis.In states such as Orissa where medical manpower is a serious problem, the government is planning to deploy MBBS students of 7th, 8th and 9th semesters (fourth year and fifth year) on Covid-19 duty. There are 1,500 such students in the state.Some students are apprehensive. “My seniors said there are no masks or PPE available for doctors. Pushing us to the forefront in such a situation could create problems for us,” said an MBBS student of a government-run medical college.In a private medical college, which has partnered with the state government to open a separate 500-bed Covid-19 hospital, two doctors have threatened to resign after the management asked them to work in the corona-care facility.