Hundreds of pharmacies closed in eastern Spain on Monday in a strike to demand the government step in because indebted regional authorities cannot pay them their bills.
Two thirds of the 2,200 pharmacies in the Valencia region joined in the first day of a rolling strike with just over 700 of them open, a spokesman for the regional College of Pharmacists said.
The open-ended strike aimed to draw attention to the “dramatic situation that pharmacies in Valencia are suffering,” he told AFP, adding that no incidents were reported during Monday’s strike.
He said the regional government owed the pharmacies 450 million euros ($575 million) for prescription medicine issued under the public health system between May and September.
“Five hundred pharmacies could be seized in a few months” if the money is not paid, he said.
Spain’s autonomous regions, which control budgets for health and education, have seen their debts soar since the collapse of a real estate boom in 2008 that has driven Spain to seek Eurozone bailout funds for its banks.
Valencia and eight of the other autonomous regions have requested rescue funds from the central government to help finance their deficits.
Pharmacies were “demanding from the central government the kind of rescue that the banks have had, to get out of this situation, because the Valencia region says it has no cash,” the pharmacy group’s spokesman said.
This year’s regional fund has almost been exhausted but the budget ministry said Monday the government would renew it in 2013, with conditions obliging the regions to pay pharmacies and other service providers.
Madrid, Nov 05, 2012 (AFP)
