Guatemala Reinstates Fired Doctors
The partial strike in the Guatemalan hospitals moved towards a possible solution after the government promised to reinstate Friday physicians that had been fired from their jobs.

The agreement was reached at a meeting in the Executive headquarters among President Oscar Berger, Vice President Eduardo Stein, representatives of the Medical School and striking physicians.

They also decided to create three commissions to follow the fulfillment of the main medical demands, which include a program to verify the purchase of supplies, submitting to Congress a widened health project and beginning negotiations to pass the doctors statutes.

Besides, strikers want the resignation of Health Minister Marco Tulio Sosa and directors of several hospitals.

The protest began on June 9 when residents at Roosevelt hospital, in Guatemala City, stopped outpatient services for the lack of supplies, surgical material and medicines.

It gradually extended to 16 other health centers in the nation to pressure authorities, who promised to immediately supply hospital drugstores and start procedures to buy equipment.