Rescue services, clinic staff, doctors - Hamburg's healthcare system announces strikes

The service trade union ver.di and the Marburger Bund have called for warning strikes in the Hamburg health care system. According to ver.di, several thousand employees from Hamburg hospitals, psychiatric clinics, care facilities and rescue services will go on strike on Tuesday and Wednesday (March 14/15). The Marburger Bund announced that it was calling on doctors to take part in a warning strike on March 21 in Hamburg. Doctors from several state associations of the Marburg Federation are expected to attend.

According to ver.di, there will be a strike on March 14 and 15 under the motto "Health is worth its weight in gold and so are we". On Tuesday, the strikers would drive from their clinics to the strike meeting with a rally starting at 10 a.m. in front of the union building at Besenbinderhof. On Wednesday, the demonstration should start at 9.30 a.m. on the Gänsemarkt, and then lead to the strike room in the union building. The warning strikes would last from the beginning of the early to the end of the late shift, it said.

On March 21, according to the Marburger Bund, striking doctors gather at 11:30 a.m. in front of the Asklepios Klinik St. Georg. After an opening rally starting at 12 p.m., the demonstration will move through the city center to the Gänsemarkt. The final rally will take place there at 1:30 p.m., it said.

Public sector employees in Hamburg continued their warning strikes with a large rally on Friday. According to the Verdi union, more than 1,000 employees from various areas of the city administration took part in the Gänsemarkt. Among them were employees of the Hamburg State Opera and other cultural institutions, the city cleaning department and the Hamburg Port Authority (HPA).

According to the city cleaning department, the warning strike affected, among other things, the recycling yards, large parts of the garbage collection, bulky waste collection and the mobile collection of problematic materials. Theatergoers also felt the warning strike. The opera performances planned for Friday and Saturday should only take place in concert because of the strike, as the opera announced on its website. Concertante means that there is no stage design, no costumes and no scenic interaction between the singers.

Verdi is demanding 10.5 percent more wages for the around 2.5 million employees in the federal and local public services nationwide, but at least 500 euros more per month. The employer side has so far offered five percent more money in two steps and one-off payments of 2500 euros. The third round of negotiations is scheduled for March 27-29 in Potsdam.