These are the reasons for the health workers

The Executive Committee of the Spanish Confederation of Medical Unions (CESM) approved on Tuesday the call for a strike throughout Spain for the month of May against the draft Framework Statute presented by the Ministry of Health. The initiative seeks to achieve a legislative change that allows healthcare workers to negotiate their working conditions, ensuring them real representation in the regulation of their rights and obligations.

According to the Andalusian Medical Union (SMA), which supports this strike, the decision is a consequence of the dispute that this organization and the CESM have been maintaining with the Ministry of Health for the last two years, during which meetings of the Negotiation Area have been held to modify the Framework Statute.

"Endless days with ridiculous breaks"

The SMA statement highlights the "unanimous" rejection of the draft prepared by Mónica García's team. The organization argues that over the last 40 years it has seen "how rights have been cut back while obligations have been imposed on doctors without any kind of compensation."

Specifically, they complain about "having to endure long, compulsory work days , with ridiculous breaks, ignoring working hours for retirement purposes, with overtime payments less than a normal hour and with an Administration that promotes, supports and boasts of invading the exclusive powers of doctors by other professions with lower training and capacity requirements."

The call for a strike will take place on May 23rd as its first day, and its main demand is "the need for a special negotiation to legislate a statute for doctors and physicians that will regulate the obligations and rights of doctors and physicians in the National Health System as a basic standard of the state, which will equalize the working conditions of all doctors in Spain and will allow for the loyalty of a group that feels particularly mistreated in recent years in its task of providing the best possible health care to the population."

References

SMA (2025). CESM and SMA announce the call for a medical strike against the draft Framework Statute prepared by the Ministry of Health. Consulted online at https://www.smandaluz.com/sma-cesm-convocatoria-huelga-medica-contra-borrador-estatuto-marco/ on February 25, 2025.

Do you want to receive the best content to take care of your health and feel good? Sign up for our free newsletter.