Mozambique: Activities to be affected by the doctors’ strike – Carta

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Mozambique: Activities to be affected by the doctors’ strike – Carta

3:33 CAT | 04 Nov 2022

FILE - For illustration purposes only.[File photo: VOA]

Five days after calling what seems set to become the country’s third general strike by doctors, the Medical Association of Mozambique (AMM) has released guidelines on the stoppage starting next Monday and the activities that will be affected during the strike’s first 21 days.

According to the AMM, the strike will begin at 7:00 am next Monday (07-11) and will cover all doctors working in the public administration, assigned to public health units and institutions subordinated to the Ministry of Health, namely: Provincial Health Services; Provincial Health Directorates; District Services for Health, Women and Social Action; Municipal Health Councils; Research Institutions; Health Training Institutions; Medical Examination Centres, and; medicine and medical supplies warehouses.

According to the AMM document, five activities will be affected by the strike: outpatient consultations, including special/personalised medical consultation; elective surgeries; auxiliary diagnostic tests of an elective nature; elective diagnostic medical procedures, including autopsies; all public health activities; teaching activities in all public sector health training institutions (training centres, institutes and universities); and mentoring/supervision of internships in health facilities.

However, the doctors are saying they will guarantee the provision of minimum services, with emphasis on emergency room and resuscitation services for adults and paediatric patients; urgent gynaecology services and delivery rooms; emergency operating rooms; inpatient services (wards); and imaging services.

“Doctors from each sector must prepare schedules which ensure the provision of minimum services to patients,” the AMM guidelines read, detailing that, in each sector, there will be between two to three doctors, depending on the type of health centre in question.

As to what doctors should and should not do during the 21-day strike, the AMM states that doctors assigned to the sectors affected by the strike should not be present at the workplace; doctors not scheduled to provide minimum services should also not report to work; while the doctors scheduled to provide the minimum services must present themselves at their respective workplaces, at the times they are scheduled in order to guarantee patient care.

During the strike, the doctors say, the AMM Board of Directors will appoint a spokesperson for each province and district, who will be responsible for sharing the AMM’s communications and guidelines, as well as reporting the main incidents of the strike.

“Aspects to be reported will be: threats and attempts to coerce or impede the exercise of the right to strike; non-compliance with the minimum services by the doctors assigned for this purpose; and replacement, by the employer (MISAU), of doctors on strike by other professionals who at the time of the call of the strike were not assigned to these workplaces (violation of number 8 of article 202 of the Labour Law)”.

If it goes ahead, this will be the third doctors’ strike, coming nine years after the first two. In the note shared with the media, the doctors say that they will only end their strike once their list of demands has been met.

By Abilio Maolela

READ: Doctors threaten to paralyse all activities if the government tries to make the strike unfeasible

Source: Carta de Moçambique