After several months of unprecedented strike, the health minister Agnès Buzyn unveiled, Monday, September 9, his plan to unburden the emergencies. The state plans an investment of "more than 750 million euros" between 2019 and 2022.
But as soon as it was announced, the minister's "refoundation pact" was rejected outright by the strikers, who continue to demand additional beds and staff. A crisis that is bogged down as many health professionals leave the public hospital for work or acting.
Cascade resignations
Dr. Sabrina Ali Benali worked several years in the emergency room before leaving the hospital at the death of her soul to start her own: "In the end, I could not hold my days of 24 hours, physically it is not was more possible, I was under anxiolytics, I fell in. Today I have time and I earn a better living with the liberal medicine.I want to return to the emergency room, because it is my vocation, but I must preserve my health. "
A study by the regional health agency, published in June, indicates a sharp increase in departures among emergency physicians, with at least 119 resignations in 2018 in Île-de-France. The communication service of the AP-HP (Public Assistance - Paris Hospitals), interviewed by France 24, says however that there is no "major difficulty of recruitment". A version denied internally by a member of the paramedical team wishing to remain anonymous: "Currently, there are seven vacancies at the Lariboisiere hospital.Bicêtre hospital, there are eight.Two departures of Caregivers and eight departures of nurses are expected by the end of the year.The turnover is huge and it destabilizes considerably services.
>> To read: In emergencies, "we can not cure if the caregivers are not well"
Temporary and paid professionals much better paid
Among the main demands of the Inter-Emergency collective is wage increases. The group coordinating the protest movement estimates the average income of a nurse, after seven years of career, to 1,800 euros net per month and 1,400 euros net for a caregiver. Figures well below average in the OECD. If doctors benefit from higher salaries, they can considerably increase their income by opting for temporary or liberal work: "We ask doctors to work for 2,500 euros per month, while in acting, a doctor can earn more than 600 euros in one night "denounces doctor Sabrina Ali Benali.
This income gap is also true among nurses, who can earn between 3,000 and 4,000 euros in the liberal profession, say the interviewees. A global trend that did not date yesterday for Patrick Pelloux, president of the Association of Hospital Emergency Physicians of France: "For thirty years, successive governments have avoided any negotiation on working conditions, everything has been done to break public service for the benefit of the private sector Today, Agnès Buzyn wants to create its telephone platform, that represents thousands of positions and once again one favors the liberal professions to the detriment of the public hospital. "
The public hospital is "the work in the chain"
While the solutions to wage conflict can be controversial, the critical situation of emergencies is no longer a matter of debate: the healthcare staff is overwhelmed by an influx of care that is seriously endangering the lives of patients.
For Dr. Ali Benali, this sad conclusion is primarily the result of inadequate political management: "We wanted to make the hospital profitable by thinking about just-in-time care, but we can not calculate people's lives on tables. Excel: In the face of lack of money, we opted for System D a long time ago, by caulking windows with cardboard, replacing air conditioners broken by fans, but today this system is cracking. "
Clementine Fensch, a public nurse, added to this difficult situation an unsustainable institutional violence: "We are working on the production line, in this context the fear of the accident is permanent for the doctors, of course, but also the nurses The liberal regime is not ideal, it isolates you and there is no more teamwork, but we can take the time we want for acts, we is his own manager. "