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Saturday, February 08, 2003More than 6,000 German doctors held a one-day strike Wednesday to protest a pending health-care reform that they say will hurt patients. The strikers focused their protest on the northwestern area of Westphalen-Luppe, where an estimated 5,000 offices were closed. Other doctors protested in such places as Stuttgart, Bremen and the state of Brandenburg; near the capital of Berlin. They're upset about reforms that will limit their incomes: The health care reform being drawn up by Health Minister Ulla Schmidt has not been released yet. But it will be designed to stop the huge deficits being run up by the country´s health insurers and prevent further increases in premiums that about 40 percent of people in Germany´s public health insurance system will pay this year. The doctors are also angry about the government´s decision to freeze their salaries this year as part of its efforts to control costs. The freeze was the final straw Peter Orthen-Rahner, head of a federation of 60,000 German doctors, told the Reuters news agency on Wednesday. Meanwhile, here in the States, the doctor strikes are going largely unnoticed. (via Gruntdoc.) posted by Sydney on 2/08/2003 08:19:00 AM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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