Health workers demonstrate for public health services in Madrid

In a statement made by the doctors' unions, it was demanded that "investments in the health sector should be increased so that hospitals can provide quality and universal service with 100 percent state support." Doctors, who have been on strike for nearly 2 months in Madrid, the capital of Spain, organized a widely attended demonstration with the support of other healthcare workers. Thousands of doctors and nurses gathered in front of the Ministry of Health building and marched in the city center. The demonstration, held under the slogan "No to cuts in public healthcare services," criticized the healthcare plans of the right-wing People's Party, which is in power in the Madrid autonomous government. In a statement made by the doctors' unions, it was demanded that "investments in the health sector should be increased so that hospitals can provide quality and universal service with 100 percent state support." Improvement of conditions is demanded Family physicians and first aid doctors, who took a break during the Christmas period from the indefinite strike they launched on November 21, 2022 on the grounds that their demands for a salary increase, improvement of working conditions and staff recruitment were not met by the autonomous government government, decided to resume their strike at the beginning of the week. Doctors' strike to spread nationwide It has been announced that the doctors' strikes in Madrid will spread to other parts of the country, such as Catalonia, Valencia, Extremadura, Andalusia, Navarra and Aragon, for similar reasons. Doctors' unions in most of the autonomous communities in the country have announced that they will strike on different dates. On the other hand, due to the increase in strikes and respiratory diseases, emergency rooms and first aid units in many hospitals in Spain are overcrowded. It has been reported that patients in some hospitals are waiting in corridors for 3-4 days to be admitted to the ward.