Planning sickness over a holiday ...

hehe

It can't get any better.. With government employees clocking more than 20 days off since the beginning of the year (hey, we're only in February), some decide to add more insult to injury.

Here's a piece from Bahrain Tribune:

2,000 sickies issued in a day

About 2,000 people were granted sick leave at Bahrain health centres on Tuesday, Ministry of Health sources told the Tribune yesterday.
“While an average of 60 such certificates are issued at each of the 23 centres daily, more than 400 were issued at Al Razi Health Centre in Manama alone on Tuesday,” sources said.
Assistant Undersecretary for Training and Planning, Dr Fawzi Amin, admitted this might have been the case. “The number is very high but it doesn’t seem unusual. There are a lot of people who plan to fall ill before a long holiday. There is generally a lot of extra sick leave issued every Wednesday and Thursday as well,” he said.
“In this case, those who managed Tuesday off have, in fact, come up with a five-day holiday.” However, he said health-centre doctors were not authorised to allow more than two days off.
Dr Amin said the ministry was monitoring the sick-leave issue. He said that all health centres had been instructed to include complete information in sick-leave notes, especially the diagnosis and the physician’s name.
“The purpose is to monitor doctors granting more leave than others so that remedial steps could be taken.”