Health professionals making more than 100 visits per year in the capital will be exempt from parking fees as of January 1.
Doctors, nurses, midwives, physiotherapists and speech therapists will be officially exempt from parking fees during their visits to Paris, from 1er January 2018. It is a decision of the City of Paris, which announced it this Tuesday.
In detail, these health professionals working in the capital, and registered in Paris or in the inner suburbs, will receive a “PRO Home Care” card free of charge, provided they can prove at least 100 interventions per year.
For others, a reduced rate will be offered, “close to the residential rate”. The City of Paris considers that this aid is justified, “because of the importance of the daily missions that they carry out.
Zero tolerance
This is a great victory for the unions of doctors and other medical professions, who have been fighting for months to relieve their members of these fees. “Many cities (Lille, Lyon, Clermont-Ferrand, Troyes, Pau, etc.) have established a zero tolerance policy and issue doctors or impose exorbitant parking fees”, recalls the Confederation of French medical unions (CSMF) in a communicated.
“The CSMF, which has supported the CSMF 75 on this file for a year, is pleased that its two main demands have finally been heard by the City of Paris”.
The times are changing
If in the past the Caduceus exempted parking fees, today this is no longer the case. The abuses – by the doctors themselves, and by the use of forgery – and the hardening of the parking policy throughout France, have prompted town halls and their agents to abandon this tolerance.
“There have been drifts, explained in 2016 to Why actor Dr Bernard Jomier, deputy mayor of the capital. In Paris, there are more than 10,000 caduceus while we know that barely 900 doctors really need it ”.
A reform, adopted in 2015, provided for a card intended for mobile professionals, costing 240 euros per year, and the purchase of which gave access to a reduced rate. A solution that had not attracted the support of medical unions.
Looking for a model
Paris isn’t the only city where fines and parking fees are raining down on doctors performing medical visits. The CSMF listed them. The city of Lille thus offers an annual package of 750 euros. In Limoges, it is 40 euros per month, and in Pau, 60. Finally, for the union, the pomp goes to Troyes which has developed a system that is at least “original”. The hours of medical visits are tolerated from 9 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. and from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. Outside of these time slots, doctors must pay.
On the side of good students, Nancy has already set up a “health badge”, which allows health professionals working in the territory of Greater Nancy to park for free for 60 minutes.
In a context where the demand for home care is part of a global trend of reorganization of care, the initiative of the City of Paris seems beneficial to all, and at lower cost for the community.
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