Dozens of health care workers leave Hungarian hospitals during the third wave of the pandemic!

1st March was the deadline for doctors and healthcare professionals to sign their new contracts under the health service status. According to the Medical Act that was accepted last October, doctors and nurses are allowed to work for a state or municipal health service provider within such a legal relationship.

Preliminary feedback suggested that an average of 10% of health care workers would reject to sign their new contract; however, the actual numbers have finally come to light this week on Monday. 

As part of the Act, the medical wage increase has been in effect since January 1, affecting just over 41,000 doctors, with their salaries rising in three steps – first in 2021, then in 2022 and 2023.

An important element of the regulation is that the new employment relationship includes, among other things, the withdrawal of gratuity.

Since its promulgation, the Act has undergone many amendments – for example, health workers can be retrained for a maximum of 44 days instead of the originally planned two years, and an agreement has been reached to allow any second job that does not conflict with the full-time job. In Hungary, more than 50% of doctors work in two or more jobs at the same time, and 37% of specialists also have private prescriptions, where they treat patients for about six hours a week – reported by the Hungarian news potral Világgazdaság.

As we reported last week, the regulation related to the new health care contract set out on-call and overtime rates with the minimum prescribed by a previous law. Accordingly, for a weekday night duty, 70% of the daytime hourly wage would be paid.
The new restrictions caused such an enormous resistance among health care workers that in several hospitals complete classes threatened with dismissal.