Health workers to hold candle-lighting for slain Cavite doctor

SAN PEDRO CITY — Public health workers will gather for a candle-lighting event on Thursday afternoon to demand justice for the killing of Dr. George Repique Jr. and urge the government to protect its frontline health personnel.

Dr. Gene Nisperos, vice chairperson of the Health Alliance for Democracy, said the event will be held in front of the University of the Philippines (UP) in Manila.

Repique, Cavite’s provincial health officer of seven years, was shot dead by motorcycle-riding gunmen in Trece Martires City on Tuesday evening.

He was also a former faculty member of the UP Department of Family and Community Medicine.

“We strongly condemn what happened to George and demand justice as these things send a chilling message to our frontline health workers at the grassroots. The DoH cannot say this was an isolated incident and must (instead) send a strong, unequivocal message that it will protect its own personnel,” Nisperos said in a phone interview.

He said Repique was the third public physician killed in 2017.

In April, ophthalmologist Dr. Sajid “Jaja” Sinolinding was shot dead in Cotabato City, while “doctor to the barrio” Dreyfus Perlas was gunned down in Kapatagan, Lanao del Norte in March.

“None of these (cases) has been resolved,” he said. JE