Decree regarding doctors working on a temporary basis was not submitted to the Council of Ministers. More than a thousand affected doctors threaten to shut down NHS emergency services.

Tensions are rising in the health sector over the anticipated changes to the work of private healthcare providers, which threaten to paralyze the country.

The newspaper Diário do Notícias reported this Thursday, the 6th, that "the final version of the document should have gone to the Council of Ministers yesterday, but, in fact, it didn't." The newspaper adds that the Prime Minister, Luís Montenegro, and the Minister of Health, Ana Paula Martins, met beforehand.

Yesterday, November 5th, the newspaper Público reported that more than a thousand doctors providing services, gathered in a WhatsApp group, are preparing a strike in emergency rooms to coincide with the publication of the decree, intending to shut down the emergency services of the National Health Service (SNS) for at least three days.

Citing industry sources, DN writes today in a paid news article that the news that "a group of more than a thousand professionals is willing to stop emergency services when the decree regulating task-based activity comes into force" surprised "everyone," including the supervisory authority, which led to the decree not being considered at the meeting.

At issue is the regulation of medical work in the provision of services, approved by the executive branch at the end of October, which aims to regulate the amounts paid to these healthcare professionals and provides for a regime of incompatibilities.

With this measure, the Government intends to minimize the differences in pay between doctors who have contracts with the National Health Service (SNS) and doctors who work as service providers, the so-called "task workers".

According to a July report from the Public Finance Council, the contracting of medical services to address the shortage of specialists in local health units (ULS) registered a 3.6% increase in total contracted hours in 2024, corresponding to an expenditure of almost 230 million euros, 11.7% more than in 2023.

Yesterday at the Council of Ministers press conference, which, according to DN, should have reviewed the decree, António Leitão Amaro, Minister of the Presidency, said that the Government maintains its conclusion that the current situation needs to be changed and "will make that change," which foresees a set of incompatibilities, but also an "easy, quick and stable mechanism" to allow the integration of temporary doctors into the National Health Service (SNS).

In the words of Leitão Amaro, the proposal "resolves the inequity, injustice and abuses," allowing amounts paid to contract doctors to "be made available" for more healthcare for patients.