Brazil’s São Paulo city network doctors decide to go on strike on the 19th

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Doctors of Primary Health Care (PHC), who work in basic units of São Paulo, decided to go on strike on Wednesday (19) and maintain a state of permanent mobilization. The decision was made at an assembly on Thursday night (13).

They ask the City Hall of São Paulo and the Municipal Health Secretariat to hold a meeting with the professional category union, an answer to restructuring the out-of-service teams, and a plan to replace the dismissed professionals.

In the assembly, they decided to give a deadline of Monday (17th) for the answer and promised to reevaluate the strike.

One hundred and fifty doctors attended the assembly. The list of demands includes the immediate hiring of more teams to care for flu syndromes, no obligation to attend on weekends and holidays, and dialogue between the union and the city hall.

Professionals say they are being asked to work on Saturdays without additional pay.

The health professionals argue that the teams are exhausted, there are endless workdays, demands for goals, lack of supplies, and overcrowded health units.

The situation has worsened in recent weeks with the advance of the omicron variant and the influenza epidemic, which led to the dismissal of about 1,600 municipal health workers, an increase of 111% compared to the beginning of December.

On Wednesday morning, a team from the São Paulo Doctors Union (Simesp) visited the Basic Health Unit (UBS) Santa Cecília in the capital center. The unit should have eight doctors and was operating with only three. There are similar reports of a shortage of professionals in other UBSs in the city.

In an open letter released on Thursday, the health professionals who work in the UBSs of the city of São Paulo highlight the failures of the strategies of the Municipal Health Secretariat and the Social Health Organizations, which currently manage primary care in the city.

“The political choice of the São Paulo City Hall in the face of the H3N2 Influenza outbreak is to communicate to the media, before communicating to health workers about important issues such as opening dates of UBSs on holidays and weekends, dates of vaccination campaigns, etc.”, says the letter.

According to Simesp, the doctors have been dealing with an intense overload and physical and mental illness for more than two years.

In response to the demands of the doctors’ union, Sindhosfil (the union that represents the 14 social health organizations that manage primary care in the city) said that the physicians’ demands are the city’s responsibility and that there were no financial sources to pay for the claims.

The Municipal Health Secretary informed the union that it authorized overtime payment to the professionals working on Saturdays. And that the Social Health Organizations have already been authorized to hire doctors and nursing staff to meet the increased demand.

As for the missing drugs, the secretariat acknowledged the shortage due to importation problems and canceling purchases already committed because of the pandemic.

In a note to the report on Wednesday midnight, the secretariat said that since the beginning of vaccination against covid, in January 2021, the folder authorized hiring by nursing and administrative staff partners to assist in immunization.

In a note to the report on Wednesday midnight, the secretariat says that since the beginning of vaccination against covid, in January 2021, the folder authorized hiring by nursing and administrative staff partners to assist in immunization.

Since last Saturday, January 8, the units started to open every Saturday until the reduction of symptomatic respiratory cases in the capital.

“The partners will start the schedule of payment of overtime beginning this month and, for those of the direct administration, which start from this phase of the pandemic the service on Saturdays, the SMS will be publishing an ordinance and payment of extra duty.

Until this Friday, the Municipal Health Secretariat says that, together with the partners, it will close the amount of hiring to support the gateway of the equipment, including expanding the framework and hours of some units to 10 pm or even transforming 12h units into 24h.

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