Doctors in Catalonia say that 39% of professionals have gone on strike, while the Catalan Health Service (Salut) puts the figure at 6%.

BarcelonaDoctors across the country are going on strike again this week to demand their own collective bargaining agreement that exclusively regulates their working conditions. Two weeks ago, the Ministry of Health and labor unions—which do not include medical unions— They signed an agreement for a new framework statute.The law regulating the working conditions of healthcare professionals in Spain, which had not been updated for 22 years, has been amended. However, the new regulations do not satisfy the organizations representing doctors, who have been protesting for months with strikes and demonstrations to express their discontent. This time, the strike committee of the Spanish Confederation of Medical Unions (CESM), which includes regional organizations—among them Doctors of Catalonia, the largest medical union in the country—has called a five-day strike, the longest to date, to continue pressuring the Spanish government. In an initial assessment, the Catalan Health Department estimated that 6% of doctors participated in the strike. However, according to Doctors of Catalonia, the strike participation rate was 39% on Monday. According to the largest union, 44% of primary care physicians (those working in primary care centers) have joined the strike, while 25% of hospital staff have done so. Nationwide, pending an official report from the Ministry of Health, the CESM (Confederation of Medical Unions of Catalonia) asserts that the strike has averaged nearly 90% participation in hospitals and 85% in primary care across all autonomous communities. "If they think we'll tire of protesting, they're very wrong. We understand it won't be short or easy, but the medical community has made its voice heard," Xavier Lleonart, Secretary General of Doctors of Catalonia, told ARA, making it clear that the mobilizations are a direct response to government policies. In fact, the Catalan union supports the five-day strike and has also organized two days of protests this Monday and Friday against the department. However, they only plan to take to the streets with a large demonstration on Friday, and on the other days they are simply urging professionals not to go to work. They also do not expect to negotiate with the Catalan Health Department (Salut), since, so far, the department "has not offered any cooperation" to prevent the protests.

In recent months, Catalan doctors have mobilized for their own collective bargaining agreement and also to achieve professional improvements, although Lleonart emphasizes that this week's call for action does not address salaries, because the "top priority" now is securing the agreement.

At the beginning of January, the Catalan union and the other regional medical unions joined the strike committee of the Spanish Confederation of Medical Unions (CESM) to form a united front against the Ministry of Health. As a result of this historic union of unionsThey have called for five-day strikes each month, beginning this week and expected to continue until June. Lleonart also criticizes the Minister of Health, Olga Pané, and argues that Catalonia has the authority and the capacity to improve doctors' working conditions. The minimum services mandated stipulate that normal operations must be maintained in emergency services; intensive care units (ICUs); and other specialized units, such as hemodialysis, neonatology, and radiotherapy and chemotherapy treatments, as well as all those considered life-threatening emergencies. Surgical procedures that cannot be postponed will also be carried out. In primary care and urgent care centers, urgent care must be guaranteed, with 25% of staff providing services on the first day; from the second day onward, staffing will increase to one-third.

"Parliamentary complexity"

The Ministry of Health managed to unblock negotiations on the framework statute at the end of January after much back and forth between unions and the administration, strikes, and threats to shelve the text altogether. The agreement, signed with the unions SATSE-FSES, CCOO, UGT, and CSIF, was reached after more than 60 meetings, as highlighted by the Minister, Mónica García. Even so, it was born flawed, lacking the support of the medical unions, which are escalating their actions this week with five days of strikes across the country. These mobilizations could affect the timeline for the law, which must pass through Congress and the Senate for processing. The document must first be approved by the Council of Ministers, which will authorize the formal start of its legislative process. From that point, the required reports will be requested from the ministries with affected responsibilities, including Finance, Economy, Public Administration, and Social Security, and it will be analyzed by the Government's Delegate Commission for Economic Affairs (CDGAE). Subsequently, it will be approved in a second round by the Council of Ministers and sent to Congress for legislative processing.

The minister already stated on the day of the agreement that she hopes the law can be approved before the end of the legislative term. However, it remains to be seen what impact the doctors' stance will have during its passage through the Cortes Generales (Spanish Parliament), as the Spanish government needs broad consensus with parliamentary groups to pass the initiatives it promotes.

"We hope that, despite the parliamentary complexity we face, there will also be a broader perspective from the political groups and that they will be able to put themselves not only in the shoes of healthcare professionals, but also in those of patients," García argued. The biggest challenge for Pedro Sánchez's government is securing the support of Junts, which has broken with the Socialists and is already... to overturn the decree in Congress which included the increase in pensions and the anti-eviction measures.