A pregnant Algerian doctor who was denied maternity leave has died of the coronavirus, prompting the dismissal of the Ras El Oued hospital director, AFP reports.

Wafa Boudissa, the 28-year-old victim, was eight months pregnant when she died on Friday night.

Boudissa had requested early maternity leave three times, but the hospital chief refused to let her have time off.

Boudissa’s colleagues had signed a petition backing her request to take early maternity leave, after a presidential decree, released as the coronavirus reached Algeria, stated that pregnant women and mothers were among individuals allowed to take exceptional leave from work.

According to Algerie Focus, Boudissa’s husband had moved the family to an apartment near the hospital at the start of Ramadan, after the director refused his wife early maternity leave.

Adding, the hospital director also refused to recognise the difficulties posed by transport and movement restrictions in the city as a result of the national lockdown.

Boudissa was working at the Intensive Care surgery unit of the Ras El Oued hospital in eastern Algeria, but the medical centre has denied she was treating coronavirus patients.

According to the hospital, all coronavirus patients in the province are being treated at another centre in the city.

Health Minister Abderraham Benbouzid sacked the hospital director after the news of Boudissa’s death was reported. (Agency report)