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French doctors to strike

over cost-cutting plan

PARIS: A French doctors' union has called a strike against government plans it fears will turn practitioners into accountants.

The Doctors Union Confederation urged members on Friday to stop work on April 24 when the cabinet discusses proposals to tighten up on prescriptions and penalise doctors both individually and as a group if cost targets set by parliament are not met.

"We are going from a duty of medical results to a duty of financial results," said Claude Maffioli, head of the union which represents 15,000 of the country's 200,000 doctors.

"We face a clear risk of medical care rationing," he said.

Another professional group, the Union of Liberal Doctors, said it too was considering protests against proposals unveiled earlier in the day by Labour and Social Affaires Minister Jacques Barrot.

"It is a total upheaval in medical practice," said its leader, Jean-Louis Caron.

"Accounting will take precedence over the quality of health care. If a doctor complies, he will have to pay for those who don't."

The proposals, to be imposed by decree, are a main plank in Prime Minister Alain Juppe's effort to bring the state budget deficit below the level set for membership of Europe's monetary union in 1999.

Barrot says that unless medical costs are curbed the government will have to either raise payroll taxes or lower the quality of healthcare.

The government has implicitly admitted that it would not meet its targets for medical costs this year.

Juppe had to drop another part of his planned reforms after a public transport strike last year against proposals to bring civil service pensions in line with those of private sector workers.-Reuter