The first measures to try to contain the hospital emergency crisis have just been announced by the Minister of Health Brigitte Bourguignon, without waiting for the end of the “flash mission” on the subject, launched by the President of the Republic. Emmanuel Macron, and whose results are expected before July 1st.
During an intervention at the Emergency Congress in Paris, the Minister of Health Brigitte Bourguignon took the floor to announce the first measures decided to respond to the crisis experienced by the hospital and more particularly the emergency services.
Overtime paid double
The Minister of Health feels that the subject is pressing. The day after the call to demonstrate launched by hospital staff all over France, Brigitte Bourguignon took the floor to recognize that “summer will be difficult“and that it will take”find solutions so that the French are not deprived of care“.
Indeed, 120 emergency services have been forced to limit their activity or are preparing for it, according to the count by the Samu-Urgences de France association carried out at the end of May. In an attempt to calm the growing discontent, the government has decided to reactivate the “doubling of overtime pay for non-medical staff and additional working time for doctors, for the entire summer period”.
Various measures announced
To provide reinforcement to hospitals which are sorely lacking in staff, the Minister of Health announces “an exceptional device”. The latter consists of allowing “student nurses and nursing assistants who completed their initial training in June and July to start practicing immediately, without waiting for the official presentation of their diploma“.
Still in the same vein, retirees may also be approached. According to Brigitte Bourguignon, retired carers, “volunteering to resume an activity” this summer will benefit from “facilities for accumulation with their retirement pension”. Finally, the regional health agencies (ARS) will have to “remobilize territorial crisis management systems” to coordinate public hospitals, private clinics and liberal professionals.
“Insufficient” announcements for the unions
These first announcements must be quickly supplemented by the proposals of the Braun mission, named after Dr. François Braun, head of emergencies at the regional hospital center of Metz and president of Samu-Urgences de France, responsible for overseeing the “flash mission”. For now, they are received rather coldly by the unions.
For Thierry Amouroux, spokesperson for the National Union of Nursing Professionals (SNPI), interviewed by our colleagues from France Info, “the announced means are not enough. We must give ourselves the means, change the software: raise salaries, of course, but also review the ratios of patients to nurses to make those who have stopped practicing want to come back to the hospital. There are 60,000 vacant nursing positions today. The boat sinks and Mrs. Bourguignon provides us with a glass to bail out”.
For Dr Gérald Kierzek, emergency physician and medical director of Doctissimo, “The emergency crisis reflects a real dysfunction of the entire hospital system, of the entire health system that needs to be overhauled. It is urgent that politicians take this subject head on“.