Molina Orosa doctors mobilize against the new Health statute

Medical unions have called for rallies this Monday in all communities as a preliminary step to the "great demonstration" that will be held next Thursday at the doors of the Ministry of Health against the new framework statute and to demand a specific regulation for doctors.

Health centers, hospitals and delegations and sub-delegations throughout Spain will become the scene of the protests programmed by the State Confederation of Medical Unions (CESM); Andalusian Medical Union (SMA); Association of Doctors and Higher Graduates of Madrid (AMYST), Medical Union of Euskadi (SME), Union of Medical Employees of the Canary Islands (SEMCA) and Omega Union (Union of Doctors of Galicia).

The conveners will warm up engines before the "great demonstration" that will be held on Thursday with the endorsement of the Collegiate Medical Organization (OMC) and several popular communities that have publicly shown their support.

That day is scheduled the new meeting in which the department headed by Mónica García and the unions will resume negotiations on the framework statute, whose draft is what has angered doctors for several reasons.

They complain, among other things, that the draft maintains a mandatory 48-hour workday and proposes a special one of up to 150 hours more; it does not compute the weekly daily rest hours after being on call and requires their recovery.

The Ministry, however, refutes that the text specifies that the mandatory 48-hour day is the maximum limit in the quarterly calculation, but not mandatory.

"As of today, the limit of the duration of the working day is 24 hours. The proposal is that the limit be 17 hours, which leaves freedom and flexibility to organize shifts and on-call duties as desired (days of 12, 15, 17 hours...) But that falls on the roof of management and negotiation," said the Secretary of State, Javier Padilla, on his social networks.

Regarding the controversy with the 150 hours, it would be the maximum limit, not an obligation, and would apply to those who want to do extra hours such as overtime, according to the Ministry's version, which also emphasizes the subsequent weekly daily rest hours, something that does not happen now.

Their remuneration is negotiated in the autonomous communities, but in any case, according to Health, the new statute proposes "for the first time" to put "a floor to this payment so that this price is not thrown down".

The unions also censure the "rigid" system of incompatibilities proposed, which requires exclusive dedication in the public sector to heads of section and other positions of responsibility in the National Health System.

An exclusivity that would be accompanied by its corresponding remuneration, according to the Minister, who defended the measure with this argument: "No one imagines that someone can work at Coca-Cola and Pepsi at the same time. We know that it generates conflicts of interest and bad practices that harm our National Health System."

But what most upsets doctors is the refusal to recognize the specificity of their profession with its own statute, which would be "the only solution for the health system to retain and retain" these professionals.

Something that Health rejects because, in the words of its head, "the framework statute belongs to all the professionals of the National Health System, to each and every one of them."