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R/£ Nurses join strike at Zimbabwe hospitals
January 31, 2007 Edition 1
HARARE: A handful of army doctors struggled to cope with emergencies at Zimbabwe's largest public hospital this week as regular doctors pressed on with a five-week strike that has all but paralysed public medical care.
Officials said there were about seven army medical personnel at Harare's Parirenyatwa Hospital doing a job normally carried out by more than 120 doctors.
"We are very stretched at the moment," an official in the hospital's administration department said. "But we keep hoping that a resolution to this problem will be found soon for the good of the patients."
The government called the army in earlier this month after doctors walked off the job to protest over wages which they say have been eroded by galloping inflation blamed on President Robert Mugabe's policies.
Junior doctors at state hospitals, who now make just Z$239 000 a month (worth about R6 930 at the official exchange rate but less than R360 at black market rates), stopped work on December 21 to demand salary hikes of more than 8 000%.
Desperate
The walkout left hospital waiting rooms jammed with desperate patients needing treatment.
They have since been joined by senior doctors and some nurses, all but crippling public medical care in the crisis-hit country.
On Monday nurses at the second biggest state hospital, Harare Hospital, downed tools to join colleagues at Parirenyatwa and Bulawayo's Mpilo Hospital, state television reported. Nurses at all major government health centres are now on strike.
"The position is that the strike is ongoing, it will go on until our concerns are addressed," Kudakwashe Nyamutukwa, head of the Hospital Doctors' Association, said.
Few patients are able to afford more expensive private hospitals. Most flock to cheaper but underfunded local municipal clinics -which must refer major cases to the paralysed state hospitals anyway.
Acting Health Minister Sydney Sekeramayi was unavailable for comment.
The doctors' action has further strained a struggling public health system which is also battling shortages of critical drugs and a huge patient load attributed to HIV/Aids.
Official media says more than 70% of all hospital admissions in Zimbabwe are HIV/Aids-related, often involving conditions which require complicated treatments.
Trade unions have warned of more job boycotts as earnings continue to be eroded by inflation which, at more than 1 200%, is the world's highest. Analysts say strikes for higher wages could trigger wider work boycotts and protests, escalating political tensions.
Nyamutukwa said the government had withheld January salaries for about 50 doctors at Parirenyatwa Hospital.
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