Patients die as lawyers ransack Pakistani hospital

Three patients died when hundreds of lawyers attacked a hospital in Lahore during a furious dispute with doctors.

Video showed the lawyers ransacking wards at the cardiac hospital, beating up staff and smashing equipment.

As panic spread, doctors and paramedics hid, leaving patients unattended, including those in a critical state.

Riot police fired tear gas to disperse the lawyers and more than 20 arrests were made. It took more than two hours to restore order, officials said.

The lawyers had been protesting over the alleged mistreatment of some of their colleagues by hospital staff last month.

But the final trigger for the violence appears to have been a video posted on social media by a doctor on Tuesday night in which he poked fun at the lawyers.

Via BBC