Public health doctors will go on strike in January

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Public health doctors will go on strike for three days in January.

The country’s 91 Specialists in Public Health Medicine (SPHM) are taking action as part of their 17-year battle for consultant and contract status.

The Public Health Committee of the Irish Medical Organization (IMO) has decided to notify the labor action to the HSE and the Department of Health, warning that if there is no resolution to the problem, the next action will begin on Thursday, January 14, followed by a two-day strike on Thursday 21 and Friday 22 January.

The committee says it will consider taking further action if the issues remain unresolved.

Dr Ina Kelly, Chairperson of the IMO Public Health Committee, said: “I am deeply distressed to have come to this.

“It is time for the Government to recognize its own ethical obligations and to honor the agreements.

We have not had a significant engagement with the Department of Health in the last five months, no business plan has been discussed with us, and no new contract has been agreed.

“We are in a worse situation today than a year ago.”

The four-page contract they sign gives SPHMs, in effect, the same status as an administrative secretary.

Despite this, by playing the lead role in the investigation and control of notifiable infectious diseases and outbreaks, they have led Ireland’s response to Covid-19.

Consultant status and contracts were part of a pay and productivity agreement in 2019.

It was conducted between the IMO, the Department of Health and the HSE to prevent a strike in 2019 and was due to be fully implemented in July 2020.

Much of the higher productivity aspect of the deal was accelerated due to the Covid-19 crisis.

However, even though the SPHMs took on a lot of additional work ahead of schedule, they did not get the additional pay or contracts.

Public health physicians earn a combined € 116,000 per year, while consultants earn between € 143,000 and € 199,000 on a nine-point incremental scale.

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly’s comments over the weekend are said to have angered the SPHM.

Speaking at RTÉ’s This week Sunday’s show, said it was “disappointing that public health doctors threatened to leave the field during a global pandemic.”

Donnelly has repeatedly stressed that he “fully supports the creation of consultant-level roles in public health medicine” and has said that the creation of these roles is “a priority” for him.

He presented a “business case” for the new contracts to the Department of Reform and Public Expenditure (DPER) on November 19.

However, a key flaw between the two parties is the agreement on these new contracts.

There was supposed to be an agreement before the contracts were sent to DPER, but this did not happen.

And discussions broke down in early November due to lack of progress.

It is believed that the contracts will be introduced in stages, with only a small number of SPHMs obtaining them initially.

This will affect SPHM’s already diminished morale and lead to an inevitable “exodus of experience” during the pandemic, IMO believes.

The fact that a business plan has been submitted was confirmed by DPER last week.

But a spokesman said that “it will be the subject of new commitments between departments.”

And since the agreement between at least the Department of Health and the DPER on the contracts is also part of the broader implementation of the Government’s Sláintecare plan, it could be some time before a single SPHM sees a consultant contract.



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