peace, 3 Apr (EFE).-Bolivian doctors met today one week in an open-ended strike against a decree of the President Evo Morales that increases their workday of six to eight hours, while the Government decided to counter strike with professionals that offer outpatient care.
The strike is respected “in a forceful manner” by 50,000 doctors and nurses of State hospitals and social security throughout the country to demand the annulment of the Decree, he told Efe the President of the Medical College of Bolivia, Alfonso neighborhoods.
Leader said that increased two hours to the workday not solve the problems of the system of health such as the lack of infrastructure to improve care.
They also argue that the six hour day, existing since 1970, is a social achievement that not rolling and accuse the Government of not having consulted on the implementation of the measure.
Physicians, who only attend emergency services, in La Paz today staged a March of protest, along with medical students, and blocked downtown streets.
The leaders of the sector and the Bolivian Minister of health, Juan Carlos Calvimontes, met to talk but without results.
According to neighborhoods, the refusal of the Government to cancel the Decree, doctors raised temporarily suspension of their application, insofar as a “structural study” is performed to show the situation of the health system.
Calvimontes announced that to lower the impact of the strike have been today in operation outpatient care in streets, squares, courts and Union headquarters jobs.
The Government also achieved agreements with hospitals of the Catholic Church, non-governmental organizations and the police to attend to more people. EFE
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