After having closed their practices, several thousand liberal doctors demonstrated this Tuesday, February 14 in Paris against a reform which would allow other health professionals, including nurses, to carry out certain acts of care without prior consultation with a doctor.
Behind a banner “All united in the face of contempt”, more than 10,000 people according to the organizers and 4,500 according to the police marched on Tuesday from the Ministry of Health, in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, to the Pantheon. At the origin of their challenge: a reform allowing patients to access certain nurses, physiotherapists or speech therapists, without going through a doctor. Nurses could thus treat wounds or prescribe certain drugs.
This law, which aims to respond to the severe shortage of doctors in neglected regions of so-called “peripheral” France, is supported by patient associations, mayors and nursing unions. But for Anna, who is demonstrating for the first time, going through a doctor remains necessary, especially after twelve years of training. ” If medical studies are so long, it’s not for nothing! Even when you have worked as a private nurse, you do not have the skills to establish a diagnosis of the patient as a whole, knowing all the pathologies and all their consequences. “, she argues at the microphone of Baptiste Coulonfrom the RFI France service.
“Dramatic”
Like her, thousands of other practitioners responded to the call of the unions which, with rare unanimity, called for the closure of medical practices throughout the country and for marching in the capital. This is also the case for Martine, who fears that the profession of doctor will lose its attractiveness and that young people will no longer have the motivation to settle down. ” The one who replaced me for five weeks in 2022 said that if this law was applied, she would stop general medicine. She is 28 years old. While there is a lack of general practitioners everywhere. It’s really dramatic “, she is alarmed.
For the doctors’ unions, the text will ” endanger health ” patients ” bypassing the coordination function of the attending physician “. Arguments defeated by the Minister of Health François Braun, for whom the text aims to “give more time for care” to doctors. ” I understand their concern, not their hostility he says.
Some doctors’ unions have also been demanding for several weeks an increase in the amount of the basic consultation, currently 25 euros. Health insurance offered 26.50 euros. ” a provocation for the unions, who expect no less than 30 euros. The Doctors for tomorrow collective is even asking for 50 euros.
An increase of 1.50 euro already represents 500 million euros according to Health Insurance, or “7,000 euros in additional fees” per year and per doctor. Health Insurance says it is ready to go further, ” but in a give-and-take logic “, with doctors pledging to ” taking on more patients, on call, providing unscheduled care “.
(And with AFP)