Physiotherapists association announces four-hour strike

The health insurance organisation (HIO) failed to meet the real needs of Gesy beneficiaries, physiotherapists said on Monday as they announced a four-hour work stoppage for next week.

The Cyprus physiotherapists’ association will proceed with the strike at 9am next Thursday following the lack of response from the HIO to resolve a pending issue and the insufficient intervention by the health minister.

If this continues, the association said they will hold an all-day strike on Thursday, June 15.

Physiotherapists said HIO should calculate correctly the units needed to cover the needs of all the beneficiaries of the national health scheme (Gesy).

Instead, the practice followed by the entity charged with running Gesy, showed a lack of respect for the 900 physiotherapists registered under the scheme.

“We do not accept such treatment, nor should we pay for miscalculations or the agency’s unwillingness to meet the real needs of beneficiaries,” the association’s statement said.

Last year, physiotherapists had also accused HIO over insufficient budget, saying the budgets of 2021 and 2022 were based on estimations that a total 55,000 physio sessions would be carried out per month. But there were up to 75,000 monthly sessions last year, the association had said.

Moreover, they had raised another problem that prevented them from properly assessing the patient’s needs saying they did not have access to the patient’s medical history.