Egypt’s Doctors strike Over Meager Wages, Poor Services

Doctors working in public hospitals across Egypt have gone on a partial strike, refusing to provide non-emergency services to patients to protest against poor health services and insufficient salaries.

“The strike will be in about 540 public hospitals, which is equivalent to 40 percent of the health services provided to citizens around the country,” Khairy Abdel Dayem, the head of the doctors syndicate, said in Cairo on Monday. 

Doctors performing their duties in public hospitals earn a base salary of some $46 in a month, and most of them have to work for long hours in private hospitals or clinics to boost their incomes. Public hospitals in Egypt are overcrowded and do not provide proper services to patients because of lack of funds.

“Poor people rely on these hospitals whether they like it or not,” Mona Mina, a member of the doctors’ union, said.

“But they are disgusted by them, and argue with the doctors who are also disgusted by them. They are filthy places with no facilities,” she added. 

Mina said the doctors decided to launch an open-ended partial strike after they achieved very little during their five-year push to improve health services in public hospitals. 

A spokesman for the union, Mohammed Abdel-Hamid, said that public hospitals in Egypt are “dumps”. 

He stated that the emergency room’s injection painkillers have not been supplied to the hospitals in Cairo for over a month due to insufficient funds.

“And this is in greater Cairo. Imagine how it would be if you got a little bit further out of the capital,” Abdel-Hamid said. 

“Nothing has changed since the revolution,” he said, referring to the 2011 revolution, which the Egyptians launched against the regime of Hosni Mubarak.