The Paraguayan government presented a proposal to bring the salaries of contracted doctors in line with those of appointed professionals starting in July 2027, as well as to pay for work performed on holidays from January 1 of the same year. The National Medical Association (Sinamed) considered the offer insufficient and will submit the decision on a new national strike to an assembly scheduled for this Thursday, September 3, in Asunción.
The proposal was discussed at a nearly three-hour meeting with the Minister of Public Health and Social Welfare, María Teresa Barán; the Chief of Staff of the Presidency, Javier Giménez; the Minister of Economy, Óscar Lovera; and the Minister of Labor, Employment and Social Security, Mónica Recalde. The government says it has addressed three of the four points presented by the union.
The plan provides holiday pay for more than 1,600 professionals and the direct application to contracted doctors of the salary scale used for appointed doctors, without requiring a new competitive examination for the equalization. It also provides for the appointment of 2,390 doctors who took part in the process to regularize employment conditions. According to official projections, the measures would reach about 90% of doctors in the public health network and would require approximately US$60 million.
The Executive advocates a model based on hours worked, number of contracts, specialization and seniority. Minister María Teresa Barán said that a contracted doctor could receive the same pay as an appointed doctor within that scale. Chief of Staff Javier Giménez said the funds would come from improved public spending efficiency, including a reduction in the purchase price of medicines.
Rossana González, Sinamed’s secretary-general, said the proposal does not address the main demand: an updated minimum salary for doctors. She said most of the approximately 9,000 contracted doctors would receive an increase the union considers small and that the likelihood of another stoppage is high, although the formal decision depends on the assembly at the former Metropolitan Seminary at 7:30 p.m.
The conflict is unfolding alongside a dispute over doctors’ resignations. Professionals cite approximately 150 to 190 requests, in addition to others being processed, while the Ministry of Health counts 62 documents formally submitted by noon and questions the validity of some of them. The controversy concerns how the resignations are delivered and the application of Law No. 7,445/2025, whose Article 56 provides for tacit acceptance after 10 working days without a response when the request is formally submitted.
The crisis has also revived debate over medical training. José Duarte Penayo, president of the National Agency for the Evaluation and Accreditation of Higher Education (Aneaes), said that programs subject to accreditation that are neither accredited nor in a regular accreditation process will not be able to register their diplomas. He advocated competency assessments for health professionals and said: “There is no point in building hospitals if we do not have doctors trained to a high standard.”