A spokesman for interns on strike in some of Zimbabwe's largest hospitals said the so-called junior doctors would keep defying government orders to go back to work until their demands for higher salaries and better working conditions and objections to compulsory service in rural areas after training, have been addressed.
The state-run Herald newspaper said Minister of Health David Parirenyatwa urged the doctors to return while their demands were taken under consideration.
The strike by more than 200 doctors started last week at Parirenyatwa Hospital, later spreading to Harare Hospital and Bulawayo’s Mpilo and Ubh hospitals. Tuesday four senior consultants for the authority that runs the government hospitals met with strikers and were scheduled later to brief the permanent health secretary.
Reporter Carole Gombakomba of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe asked Hospital and Doctors Association President Kudakwashe Nyakutukwa about the latest moves.
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