A 24-hour strike by doctors and vets which threatens to bring the entire national health system to its knees. Patients who were due to undergo scheduled surgery on December 12 were deferred to another date. The same goes for those who had made an appointment for a diagnostic test or a specialist visit. The doors of the clinics will remain locked and ordinary health services will be carried out with a dropper.
These are the probable consequences of the agitation that will involve doctors and health managers, both precarious and structured, on Tuesday 12 December, convened by the trade unions for the purpose of protest the lack of investment in the 2018 budget law, currently under examination by Parliament, and against stalemate on the renewal of the national contract
STRIKE FOR DOCTORS AND VETERINARS: ACTIVITIES INSURED
The slogan of the protest is already a whole program: "Healthcare closes one day so as not to close forever".
The strike of doctors and health managers will have a duration of 24 hours. No danger for those who will need emergency performance. In fact, emergency and surgical activities and the services of first aid.
At risk, however, all other benefits. In fact, patients could be forced to undergo postponements and have to wait hours for a simple medical visit or for a long-scheduled diagnostic test.
DOCTORS' STRIKE DECEMBER 12: FORECASTS
Based on the estimates provided by Anaao, the main hospital workers' union, given the high turnout expected for the strike on 12 December, suspended "40.000 surgeries, hundreds of thousands of specialist visits and diagnostic services, the blocking of all veterinary activity related to food control”.
DOCTORS AND VETERINARY STRIKE DECEMBER 12: THE DEMONSTRATIONS
“It is a far more intense strike than the last time there was a national abstention, which was about two years ago. We will do various demonstrations in the cities, said Carlo Palermo of Anaao.
Trade union associations have organized demonstrations in all Italian cities and one sit-in in front of the Ministry of Economy on via XX Settembre.
DOCTORS AND VETERINARY STRIKE DECEMBER 12: THE REASONS
A varied and important series of reasons prompted the unions to unite and call a strike: ranging from the lack of new specialists to the brain drain, passing through the impossibility of carrying out a turnover, the renewal of the contract and the precariousness .
“The increase in the national fund of one billion a year, therefore already quite low – declares Palermo – is canceled by a series of measures envisaged in this maneuver and also expected for 2018. For this reason we ask that approved the amendments to the Budget that give a little money to health care".
“The NHS – reads the note published by Anaao – supported itself on the sacrifice of doctors and health managers. And the Regions have guaranteed the LEAs, at least those that have done so, at the expense of professionals, their holidays, their ancillary resources, the abuse of their working hours. The decrease in the perimeter of public protection is provoking longer waits among citizens, greater territorial inequalities, growing gap between those who can pay for treatment and those who cannot. It's declining now the right to health based on residence and the distance between Bolzano and Naples it can be expressed in 700 km or in 4 years of life expectancy. And the situation, which the 2018 budget law does not even consider lost as it is behind bonuses of all kinds, is starting to get worse ".
STRIKE DECEMBER 12: CONTRACTS AND PRECARIAT
Not to mention the renewal of the collective labor agreement, been expected for eight years and the spread of job insecurity.
“A whole generation of young people is relegated after 11-12 years of training in precarious and atypical employment contracts. Despite this, after 8 years of blockade, the starting signal for the discussion of the CCNL has not yet been heard, in spite of the Constitutional Court and the declarations of the ministers who ensure that it will close before Christmas. Yes, but from which year?”, adds the union.
"Despite the numerous attempts by the healthcare companies to hinder a right enshrined in the Italian Constitution - says the president of the Aaroi union of anesthesiologists, Alessandro Vergallo - we expect broad participation in the strike for the widespread malaise of the category, exasperated by violated rights, blocked wages, repressed careers, excessive workloads and missed hires. In Italy there is a shortage of 4.000 anesthesiologists with obvious consequences: young doctors in training are exploited instead of specialists and the specialists themselves are forced into exhausting working conditions".
STRIKE: LORENZIN ALONGSIDE THE DOCTORS
“I am absolutely on the side of Italian doctors,” said Health Minister Beatrice Lorenzin. In this matter, she continued, “there are two problems. One is that of unlocking the turnover. Which I believe we have seriously contributed to solving ”. In fact, you explained, “with the hospital plans presented by the Regions we have given way to thousands of new hires; obviously the Regions now have to make the competitions. They must do them in a short time, because, otherwise,
this work risks weighing down and slowing down. Then there is the issue of contract renewal which is not a topic handled by the Ministry of Health, but I hope we will be able to lend a hand. And to support the good cause of hospital doctors in the first place".
