Keep up the pressure. Don’t give in. The slogans of the MG France general practitioners’ union have not changed. GPs remain firmly opposed to Minister Marisol Touraine’s health bill, which will be presented to parliament in March. “General practitioners deplore the lack of concrete answers to their demands and are determined to step up pressure on the government,” insists the union.
As a reminder, MG France is planning a new strike movement on February 5. The one engaged during the Christmas holidays as well as the administrative strike, consisting in boycotting the vital card of patients and therefore in refuse teletransmissions, were powerless to bring back the Minister of Health on the controversial provisions.
General practitioners have not won their case on their claims such as the refusal to generalize third-party payment, which allows patients to be exempted from fees in advance. The request to revalue the consultation from 23 to 25 euros has also gone unheeded. The small provocations launched by unions like the consultation at 31 euros by the union of general practitioners Unof-CSMF did not bend the government either.
Other days of mobilization
In parallel to MG France’s appeal, the Confederation of French Medical Syndicates (CSMF) and the Union of Liberal Doctors (SML) are planning a strike of the nursing staff on the weekend of January 31 and February 1. Actions should be organized the week of January 26 to 31. Finally, a national demonstration bringing together all the doctors’ unions should take place in March, just before the passage of the bill in parliament.
In addition, the Health Insurance announced that after a “real but moderate drop” in teletransmissions following the boycott of the vital card by striking doctors, it was only 5.7% in the second week, from January 12 to 19. The administrative strike would therefore not be very followed, despite what the unions say. The President of the generalist branch of the CSMF tells that the staff of the health insurance funds is “inundated with paper treatment sheets, by the tens of thousands”. Social Security indicates for its part that it is not yet able today to estimate “the potential impact on processing times. “However, she specifies that” health insurance organizations are already working to prioritize the processing of treatment sheets according to the amounts of reimbursements at stake. “
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