HUMAN rights doctors have threatened to approach the courts to seek urgent enforcement of a High Court order forcing government to provide personal protective equipment (PPE) for health personnel at the forefront of fighting the coronavirus pandemic.

Last week, the High Court ordered government to provide PPEs for frontline healthcare workers across the country to help prevent possible contraction while attending to patients.

This was after the Zimbabwe Association of Doctors for Human Rights (ZADHR), represented by the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, filed an application demanding that government provides equipment to frontline healthcare workers.

“ZADHR will soon approach the courts to seek urgent enforcement of the High Court order,” the human rights doctors said.

The human rights doctors said “special treatment of politically connected patients must not violate screening and infection control measures in hospitals and ports of entry.”

They said the continued exposure of healthcare workers to COVID-19 due to absence of PPE was in violation of the law, adding “health workers must be protected”.

“ZADHR calls upon all health institutions (private and public) to urgently institute measures that protect health workers from COVID-19,” the doctors said.