Health Care Workers Begin Preparations for Strike
Poised to go on strike, doctors and health care personnel have presented a long list of demands, which hospital directors and Ministry of Social Affairs see as utopian.
Negotiations failed last year and the Minister of Social Affairs refused to participate in talks. In January, the Public Conciliator was called in, but he could not find a solution.
Among the issues of concern are pay, vacation, training compensation, overtime pay, patient queues, uninsured patients, and the list goes on, reported Postimees.
But no one has calculated how much all that would cost.
What has been estimated, is the cost of a minimum wage increase for doctors, nurses and care providers in 2013, which the Health Insurance Fund says would cost 157.7 million euros.
The Ministry of Social Affairs has already planned a 3 percent pay raise while the unions demand, in some cases, 70 percent. For instance, doctors want to raise the minimum hourly wage from 7.16 euros to 12 euros; nurses want 6.6 euros compared to the current 3.83 euros.
As utopian as the demands may seem, the alternative is that highly qualified medical workers continue to flow out of the country to seek worthy pay, warned Katrin Rehemaa, head of the Medical Association.
Ott Tammik