Yesterday it seemed that salvation had come to the world when the head of the government, Yair Lapid, tweeted that "the preparation for shortening the shifts of the specialists to 16 hours will begin immediately in the periphery so that the agreed upon outline can come into effect by September 2023. As part of the assessments, the hospitals all over the country that are already My laws will be able to act and shorten the shifts."
Yesterday, Economy Minister Orna Barbibai also issued a statement in this vein, and it seemed that the crisis of interns that accompanies the health system out of the 20 or more that he referred was suddenly resolved.
Lapid's main and by and large achievement is that it is more likely that a budget of 66 million shekels that was promised to the hospitals and was agreed upon months ago, may be transferred to them after the very heavy pressure of the Prime Minister's office on the top of the Ministry of Finance.
Apart from that, all the new announcements and understandings are not much more than election spin that in practice has almost no real meaning or news for the health of the Israelis, maybe just the opposite.
Interns protest, archive, photo: Koko
The Prime Minister tweeted that his phone call from Berlin brought Dr. Ray Beaton, who is in charge of the organization of Marishita's interns, to agree to withdraw the letters of resignation and return to regular work.
Except that Dr. Beaton does not represent most of the 7,000 interns in Israel and the courts have already come back and determined that the only organization that legally represents the interns is the Medical Association, the only representative organization of all the doctors in Israel, without which no arrangement or agreement on the interns' work in Israel could exist and be realized .
However, this is not the only embarrassment that arises from Lapid's festive announcement.
According to estimates by the heads of the departments and the hospitals, in order to implement the shortening of doctors' shifts, it is necessary to recruit hundreds of additional doctors to the hospitals, something that is not possible in Israel against the background of the growing shortage of doctors, which is only expected to grow without significant actions by the government to solve it.
The interns' protest in Tel Aviv (archive), photo: Photo: Coco
In addition to this, one of the main innovations that Lapid and Barbibai announced in their announcement is the possibility, for the first time ever, to immediately shorten the shifts of specialists in departments or hospitals that they choose and will be able to do so.
Barbie even wrote to all hospital managements that not only the managers are allowed to do this and that it is also recommended for all hospitals in Israel.
But this option will most likely only be realized in a few large and strong hospitals in Gush Dan, while the hospitals in the periphery will be left behind, even though some of them lag behind in the quality and availability of medical care and the ability to recruit enough specialized doctors compared to the center.
Health Minister Horowitz with in a meeting with interns (archive), photo: Oren Ben Hakon
Finance Minister Avigdor Lieberman responded to the Prime Minister's announcement and said it was an "electoral spin before elections, the most powerful hospitals in the center will organize first, and if those interns get the option to work in Tel Aviv or Ramat Gan - no one will go to Safed or Nahariya."
A large part of the voters of Meretz and Yesh Atid from Tel Aviv and they made a cynical decision at the expense of the public", Lieberman's words are of course election spin in itself, but in this case - he is right.
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