NAIROBI, Kenya — More than 100 patients escaped from Kenya’s only psychiatric hospital on Monday as doctors and nurses joined a national hospital strike for pay rises. ADVERTISEMENT“The doctors messed (up) by leaving the patients unattended.”Some 5,000 Kenyan doctors, pharmacists, dentists and nurses went on strike on Monday after negotiations between unions and government over a pay rise collapsed on Sunday. Unions are demanding a 300-percent pay rise for doctors and 25- to 40-percent pay rise for nurses that was agreed upon in a 2013 collective bargaining agreement, but has yet to be implemented. He said the public should be prepared for “the longest strike ever” as doctors would not return to work until their demands were met. The striking doctors and their supporters point to recent scandals in corruption-plagued Kenya in which millions of dollars have been embezzled or gone unaccounted for, while the doctors struggle to get their wage increases.

Source: Philippine Daily Inquirer December 06, 2016 01:39 UTC