Present in nine municipalities of Alès and Cévennes, the staff of these health centers consider themselves to be the “great forgotten ones of Ségur de la santé”
“I am 63 years old, and this is the first time I have gone on strike in 40 years of activity! Everyone here has been exhausted for too long.” The words of Jacques Justet, general practitioner at the Filieris health center in Bessèges, and deputy secretary general of the UNSA CANSSM Filieris, seem to sum up the situation experienced for many months by his colleagues and himself.
This Thursday, January 12, an unprecedented event in the history of the health group according to the doctor, a national strike call is launched for all Filieris health centers. In the north of Gard, the health centers of nine municipalities, in total, should be strongly impacted today, or even be closed: Alès, Bessèges, Saint-Ambroix, Les Mages, La Grand-Combe, Saint-Martin-de-Valgagères, Salindres, Saint-Christol-lèz-Alès, Saint-Florent-sur-Auzonnet. These centers are made up of about fifty employees (25 doctors, 15 nurses and a dozen secretaries).
Worn since the Covid era
In the (many) demands highlighted by the movement, we find the factors that harm the entire health system: crucial staff shortages, overload and poor working conditions on the shoulders of caregivers and nurses “on the verge of breaking”.
But the catalyst, in this post-Covid period, is the feeling that these health centers have not received the recognition they deserve in the management of the health crisis. “For two years, we have been campaigning for recognition by the Ségur de la santé. Without anyone hearing us. Health centers have been forgotten in France while their staff have been constantly deployed to patients”continues Jacques Justet.
Unlike the hospital system, which depends on the regional health agencies, the Filieris health centers depend on the National Autonomous Fund for Social Security in the Mines (CANSSM), a special social security scheme. And which seems not to give place to the alerts launched by the unions.
A strike in a medical desert
If a dialogue deemed constructive does not begin with the Ministry of Health and the CANSSM, the UNSA does not rule out a renewal of the movement. The union ensures, for patients treated at home, that the continuity of care will remain assured. He also hopes, through this strike, to show the extremely serious impact, in these Cévennes, of medical desertification. “There are almost no more liberal doctors. The Filieris health centers are for some the last access to care. And we too are struggling to recruit new doctors and nurses.”
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