Samaras tries to resolve mobility scheme dispute with EOPYY doctors
Prime Minister Antonis Samaras is due to meet Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis and representatives of the Athens Medical Association on Monday morning to discuss the ongoing strike by doctors working for Greece’s main healthcare provider, EOPYY.
Doctors working for EOPYY said on Friday they would continue their strike, now entering its fourth week, until Monday at least and would wait for the outcome of talks at the Maximos Mansion before deciding what to do next.
The doctors are protesting plans to dismantle the service. A total of 8,691 doctors and employees of EOPYY and about 1,200 hospital staff are to be inducted into the second wave of a contentious mobility scheme that will see them being absorbed by the National Health System (ESY) or dismissed.
The government’s first step will be to scrap the positions in EOPYY. This requires a ministerial decision which, Kathimerini understands, is expected by the end of the year. The transfer then should be completed in less than 25 days.
A total of 1,089 EOPYY staff in the central administration and employees at the agency’s 26 pharmacy shops have been exempted from the mobility plans.
