Doctors strike resumes next month

Dr Herbert Luswata, the UMA Secretary-General said in a statement on Sunday, July 16th, that the non-deployment of medical interns had left them with “no choice but to re-activate a nation-wide industrial action involving all medical cadres starting on 1st August 2023.”

He noted that despite promises on multiple occasions for the issue of interns to be resolved, over two weeks into the new financial year, no steps have been taken toward deploying the stranded interns.

Over 1900 new graduates, who completed studies in 2022 are currently stuck at home, as the government claims lack of funds to cater for their internship allowances.

Both Parliament and Cabinet directed for deployment and payment of allowances for medical interns and senior house officers, and subsequently instructed the Ministry of Finance to find and allocate this money accordingly.

However, in the 2023/24 Budget read mid last month, only Shs 22 billion was allocated to pay arrears for SHOs and medical interns of the previous years (April 2022-April 2023).

Dr Luswata says although Minister Matiya Kasaija promised to have the deployment issue fixed ‘in a few weeks’ time,’ no confirmation has come through from the ministry up to now.

“This means the recently graduated intern doctors, nurses and pharmacists continue to be held in a ‘career and development limbo through no choice of their own. They cannot work and cannot serve because they do not have the necessary licenses to enable them to practice their skills up to today,” said Dr Luswata.

Upon meeting with the Minister more recently, the doctors were promised clarification in a week’s time, which has also elapsed.

The medics have now tasked the Ministry of Finance to act on their promise and provide funds for the deployment and the payment of allowances for medical interns before the date of the 1st of August 2023, failure of which, they will resume their strike.