"Don’t murder people for a pay raise. There is no justification for it," Director of Wages Ilan Levin told “IDF Radio" (Galei Zahal) as the Ministry of Finance and Israel Medical Association resumed negotiations to settle the doctors' strike.
During the meeting, Medical Association president Dr. Leonid Eidelman told Levin, "Your comments yesterday were vicious and dangerous incitement against the doctors. Any act of violence against doctors will be on your head and your conscience. You put into the public discourse an element that was never there before, merely for the sake of some objective of your own."
Levin's remark was in response to an interview with Israeli Pediatric Association chairman Prof. Mati Berkovitch, who said, "As far as I am concerned, the Treasury should hurt as much as possible, so they'll understand that we're talking about real problems." Levin said that he was shocked by the remarks and reiterated his call to the doctors to end their strike in favor of objective arbitration.
At the end of today's meeting, the Medical Association said that the Ministry of Finance was willing to offer doctors in the periphery only 10% more than other doctors, compared with the Medical Association's demand for a 25% special supplement. The Medical Association also said that the ministry refuses to ease the workload of specialists' shift to 18 hours from 26 hours without affecting specialists' income due to shorter shifts.
The Ministry of Finance wants to add specialist positions and require new specialists to carry out shifts in addition to veterans, but the Medical Association says that this would harm specialists.
The Medical Association is expected to announce further sanctions at government hospitals today or early next week.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 28, 2011
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