Summer reductions in one-third of Osakidetza primary care facilities
Ten centers will close all summer and 72 will advance the closing time. Trade unions complain that the workload of workers will be "increased".
Summer is about to start, so Osakidetza, like every year, has drawn up a summer plan for health centres and presented it to the trade unions at the sectoral table. Osakidetza has announced that 5.10% of the primary care centres in Álava, Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa will suffer some reduction. That is, 126 of the 339 centres. In addition, it is possible that the reductions affect a larger number of centers, as the planning of the final days and hours of 58 centers has not yet materialized. Osakidetza plans to implement the plan from this week.
Reductions will affect working hours and days. In fact, 72 centers will advance the closing time, so instead of closing at 20:00 hours, they will offer the service until 17:00 hours. In addition, 44 centres will remain closed for a few summer days and 10 will be closed throughout the summer. According to Osakidetza, the centers that will close all summer offer service one hour a week.
According to Osakidetza, by "lowering" demand in summer, and thanks to the primary care network, the PAC's continuing care points, emergency services and home care, the service is "guaranteed": "We have developed the plan to make quality health care compatible with rest and reduced demand for services after winter."
Restrictions: "way of life"
The trade unions criticise the cuts. ELA, for example, denounces that they are "bigger and bigger", that they occupy "longer" and that they affect "more centers": "The opening of CAP hotspots with all equipment is not guaranteed." He adds that some of the party's proposals in the elections to the Basque Parliament have not been taken into account, and that they have opted for the "lifelong path", that is, for cuts. The union denounces that they continue to "increase" the workload of the workers and "reduce" the service to the citizens and that they do not have a plan to deal with the "serious structural problems" of Primary Care.
As the Plan is provisional and the number of vacancies in the PACs has not been clarified, CCOO accuses Osakidetza of not having light: "Vacant places can be more than a thousand, and it is not clear whether the centres will have teams of full professionals. In addition, they propose that workers undertake overtime to fill vacancies, i.e. self-concertation".
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