Doctors in Berlin strike over poor pay and conditions
Berlin
Clare Chapman
German doctors are threatening to abandon their jobs and move to the United Kingdom. The row over poor pay and working conditions began almost two weeks ago. More than 2200 doctors from Charité University Medical Centre in Berlin, Europe’s largest hospital, went on strike after hospital administrators refused to listen to demands for a 30% pay increase.
Demonstrating in the streets of Berlin, the doctors—including physicians, interns, surgeons, and even heads of department—have been gaining public support with banners saying, "Patients perform your own operations," "Warning! Tired Doctors," and "England, we’re coming."
Olaf Guckelberger, a surgeon at Charité aged 38, claims that medical staff at the clinic work an average of 36 hours overtime a week, and 90% of overtime is unpaid. He said, "If the doctors are suffering, then the patients suffer too." In many cases, employees work for as little as €3 (£2; $3.50) an hour, he said. Collectively, the medical staff at the hospital put in 85 000 hours of overtime each month, and this does not include time spent on call.
Intern Katrin Koertner said, "The overtime we do is bad enough but worse is that it often goes unrewarded. We cannot claim money for it because there are work limitation regulations, and time off in lieu has to be taken within a couple of months. Most of the time we are short staffed and cannot take extra time off. If we did it would be detrimental to the patients." She added that it was a "joke" that hospital administrators wanted to cut a further 450 jobs.
Dr Guckelberger admitted that many doctors would jump at the chance to work abroad; and the UK is one of the most popular destinations. "The average monthly wage for doctors at the hospital is €5500 a month before tax, but this takes into account higher paid staff such as senior consultants and department heads. Younger doctors and those lower down earn far less. The majority could earn double that amount in the UK. I for one would work there if the opportunity arose," he said.
He and his colleagues also wanted to see a change in salary scales: "I’ve worked here since 1993 and am earning almost the same as when I started. Apart from one major rise after the first five years, salaries more or less stay the same unless you are made head of a department."
Advice centres have also been set up for doctors, for interns in particular, to find out more about working conditions and pay in other countries. In Switzerland, an intern can earn as much as €6000 gross a month for a 50 hour week and also receive full pay for being on call, unlike in Germany, where they get only 80% of their salary when on call.
Doctors in Germany are told that in Britain, doctors may only work a maximum of 56 hours a week by law; that medical secretaries are employed to write reports; and that time and a half is paid for weekend and night shifts.
Since the strike began, the hospital has provided only emergency treatment, and numerous operations have been postponed. Health authorities are worried that the protests in the capital will send a signal to doctors in the rest of the country.
The doctors’ association, the Marburger Bund, has already called for nationwide strikes and warns, "If there is no reaction, then we’ll just carry on."