Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) shows no understanding for doctors’ demands for more money. “I don’t think the demand for more money is justified,” he said on the ZDF program “heute journal update” on Thursday night. “Apart from Switzerland, of course, nowhere in Europe do practices earn as well as they do in Germany. I don’t see any scope for fee increases.”
He doesn’t understand why there is a strike. There is a “huge wave of illness” in the population. “The doctors’ demands for more money are also known. The strike doesn’t bring anything forward at all.”
Medical associations have called for family doctor and specialist practices to be closed nationwide between the years. The action, planned until Friday, is part of the “Praxis in Not” campaign, which is supported by more than 20 associations. The Virchow Association of resident doctors was unable to provide any information on Wednesday about the number of practices involved because the strike was organized decentrally. However, a spokeswoman explained that tens of thousands of practices are expected to be closed nationwide.
The practices were asked to inform their patients about the closure, to refer them to the medical on-call service and to arrange for a replacement in emergencies. Lauterbach wants to meet with the family doctors at a crisis summit in January to discuss the complained about overload and bureaucracy in the practices. “The practices need better working conditions, need less bureaucracy. The money also needs to be distributed more fairly,” he said on ZDF. “But simply pouring more money into a system like in the past – which doesn’t really work well – we’ve simply used this solution too often. It won’t be in the foreground.”
2023-12-28 06:05:23
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