ISRAEL: Hundreds of medical residents walk off jobs at hospitals

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

REPORTING FROM JERUSALEM -- Several hundred resident physicians resigned and didn’t show up for work at Israeli hospitals Monday, the latest development in a labor dispute that threatens to undermine the country’s public medical services and put patients’ lives at risk.

Hospitals announced that they were switching to emergency mode, providing lifesaving and urgent procedures but suspending most non-critical care. Within hours, staff shortages started bogging down service in emergency rooms.

‘This is an hour of despair,’ Dr. Oren Feldman, a resident at Haifa’s Rambam Medical Center, said at a news conference. ‘The future of public medicine is at stake.’

The situation constitutes a deep crisis ‘on the same scale as a war,’ Dr. Eitan Hai-Am, former director general of the Health Ministry, said in a radio interview. ‘Without the residents, we are lost.’

He and others urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who holds the government’s health portfolio, to mediate the conflict between the nation’s approximately 5,500 residents and the Finance Ministry. The residents have won widespread support within the health system, from senior doctors and hospital directors to medical students, with many having announced that they will not return to studies when the academic year opens. Netanyahu, for his part, has asked the residents to ‘demonstrate responsibility’ and give negotiations an additional two weeks. Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz urged young doctors to ‘end their anarchy’ and return to talks.

Previous efforts had not resulted in an agreement.

Two months ago, nearly 1,000 medical residents signed letters of resignation that were entrusted with their attorneys. Some letters appear to be formally in effect Monday as the state continued to seek an injunction to prevent the mass walkout. Negotiations between the residents and finance officials broke down amid heated mutual accusations.

Residents are seeking increased hourly wages and a cut in their workload, among other things.

Some demands were partially met this summer, after a months-long protest by Israeli doctors ended with an agreement hammered out with Finance Ministry officials to improve working conditions. Netanyahu’s intervention was required, particularly after the head of Israel’s medical association, Dr. Leonid Edelman, went on a hunger strike.

The agreement angered residents, however, because it binds them for nine years to a contract they say they did not agree to.

Finance officials defended the agreement Monday, citing gradual increases in monthly salaries as well as a cut in after-hours duties that would decrease young doctors’ monthly workload from 350 to 245 hours. Acknowledging this still far exceeds a defined full-time job, treasury official Gal Hershkowitz told Israel media that young doctors know what their profession is like going in.

Dr. Itay Gat, a resident at Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer, calculated his pay for a 30-minute urgent caesarean section at just under $4. ‘Does anyone really think this is appropriate?’ he asked during a radio interview.

Some residents already have new jobs lined up with local biotech companies or medical facilities abroad. If the crisis isn’t resolved, many fear, more young doctors will be pushed into private medical practices or outside the profession altogether, leaving one of the once-socialist country’s last standing functional and affordable public services professionally bankrupt, and citizens to buy the best medical care they can afford.

Increased government responsibility and funding for public services stood at the heart of the protest movement that staged mass demonstrations throughout Israel over the summer. On Sunday, Netanyahu’s Cabinet approved the Trajtenberg report, a package of recommendations for socioeconomic reform and for lowering the cost of living to ease strains on Israel’s middle class.

ALSO:

EGYPT: At least 19 people killed in Cairo clashes

IRAN: Commander labels U.S. protests as ‘American Spring’

ISRAEL: Committee urges tax hikes on rich to fund social reforms

-- Batsheva Sobelman

Photo: ‘Save public medicine in Israel’ is written on a tent in a Jerusalem protest camp this summer. Credit: Batsheva Sobelman / Los Angeles Times