site.btaGeneral Practitioners to Go on Effective Strike on March 28

General Practitioners to Go on Effective Strike on March 28

Sofia, March 26 (BTA) - General practitioners start staged effective strikes nationwide on Monday, Deputy Chairman of the Bulgarian Medical Union (BMU) Galinka Petrova said, emerging from a meeting of the BMU late on Friday evening. The decision for the effective strike action was confirmed later in the evening by BMU Chairman Lyubomir Kirov.

The strike is against the suggestion of the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) to resort unilaterally to a document determining the prices of medical services in 2016 after an agreement on a national framework agreement to this effect failed to be reached.

Associations of municipal and private hospitals too said they start effective strikes.

The protests will start from Kyustendil, Western Bulgaria, Veliko Turnovo and Razrgard, Northern Bulgaria, and Yambol, Southern Bulgaria.

BMU once again stated that the situation of healthcare has reached a critical point. BMU notes that the suggested changes do not warrant development and improvement of the system.

For the duration of the strike the general practitioners will not issue prescription for medicines paid by the NHIF. Emergency surgeries will provide services to patients.