The National Federation of Doctors (FNAM) decided today to “toughen the fight” against the Government’s health policies and will meet with the unions of the remaining professional classes in the sector to define a plan with this objective.
“We believe that the entire health sector must come together to confront these disastrous policies that have been implemented by Ana Paula Martins’ Ministry of Health, which, in essence, is merely engaging in facade negotiations with the entire sector,” the federation’s president told Lusa.
This was one of the decisions of the National Council of Fnam that met today in Coimbra to analyze the state of the National Health Service (SNS), but also the State Budget proposal for 2025 that the Government submitted to parliament on Thursday.
“We are going to start an effort to design this entire joint struggle”, said Joana Bordalo e Sá, highlighting that the decision to scale up the forms of struggle was unanimously decided by the National Council.
According to him, the doctors showed themselves to be “completely willing to toughen the fight in an effort with the rest of the professionals”, such as nurses, senior diagnostic and therapeutic technicians, psychologists, pharmacists and nutritionists, among others.
“We need doctors, but the entire health sector is being harmed by this type of policy that has been implemented by the Ministry of Health”, warned Joana Bordalo e Sá, for whom the State Budget proposal for next year is “completely empty” in measures to reinforce human resources in the NHS.
The union leader also added that the “form of struggle” has not been defined, but admitted that the possibility of a national strike by all professional classes in the public health service “is on the table”.
The State Budget proposal for 2025 foresees that expenditure on SNS personnel will increase by around 425 million euros next year, totalling 7,09 billion euros (+6,4%).
Overall, Health will have more than 16,8 billion euros available next year, with the budget allocation essentially divided between personnel expenses (41,8%) and acquisition of goods and services (49,6%), which includes the purchase of medicines, complementary diagnostic and therapeutic means and public-private partnerships.
The National Council also decided, according to Joana Bordalo e Sá, to demand that the Ministry of Health return to negotiations with the union structure, taking into account that it “represents a large portion of unionized doctors in the NHS”.
Fnam intends to negotiate with the Government the possibility of doctors returning to exclusive dedication, optionally and with an increase, the reinstatement of the 35-hour work week and the integration of interns (in training for the specialty they have chosen) into the medical career.
“As we are a structure with such representation, Ana Paula Martins’ Ministry of Health has no other solution than to meet with Fnam”, highlighted Joana Bordalo e Sá.
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