The proposal to introduce sick leave “flexible» In Spain, there has already been a new confrontation within the government. The Minister of Health, Mónica García, had to bend to the will of the Ministry of Social Security which she heads, Elma Saizby qualifying his speech and going from emphasizing that these discharges are “a medical act that we will defend until death” to opening up to “the study of the progressive reintegration” of patients without taking into account the doctor and taking into account the assumptions accepted by the new standard.
However, this measure triggered an intense debate between the different political, economic and trade union sectors of the country. This situation has generated opposing positions within the government itself, as was the case between Ministers García and Saíz.
Last year there was 8.1 million work stoppageswith 11% more compared to the year 2022. But what does the notion of “flexible” sick leave consist of? First of all, it refers to the possibility of dismissal of workers provided that the doctor stipulates it when they are completely recovered or that, depending on the case, they can, in certain circumstances, allow their integration into their work activity despite not recovering from his illness.
However, family doctors strongly disagree with flexible leave because they understand that any situation that makes them more flexible violates medical criteria and receives discharge implies an inability to carry out a professional activitybut they indicate that they would be open to partial discharges, adapted to the patient’s situation.
The spokesperson for Spanish Society of General and Family Physicians (SEMG) and member of the Mental Health Group, Lorenzo Armenterosexplains that “flexible or partial discharge” benefits from medical monitoring and allows the possibility of integrating work if the work adapts to your state of physical or emotional health or contributes to its improvement.
“A person with major depression or a person with a calcaneal fracture is different, since the latter could do partial work from home, but a person with major depression may not have an alternative,” says -he.
Current situation in Spain
In Spain, workers must submit a sick leave report from the first day of absence from their workplace. This means that anyone who must miss work for health reasons, including a cold, You must go to a doctor to obtain formal justification.
On the other hand, at the union level, the secretary for institutional relations of the UGT of Catalonia, Carlos de Pablo, assured that he had doubts about the fact that the minister, Elma Saiz, “was aware of the consequences of her occurrence. The trade unionist attacks a proposal which he cites as “ignorance” of the minister concerning the labor market.
However, in this mixture of differences of the government of Pedro Sánchezother voices also put a spin on these positions. The Minister of Labor, Yolanda Diaz (Sumar), assured that “neither flexibility nor partiality” because according to him we do not play with health. For his part, the Secretary of State for Health, Javier Padilla, states that “anyone who has been consulted will understand that this measure, if properly implemented, can be beneficial”.
Once again, before having fully supported such an important health measure, the government is launching without any rigor in launching measures such as the right to leave for patients undergoing medical treatment. cancer or when a worker cannot perform a physical task, but can perform administrative or intellectual tasks, among others, without the vision of the doctor.
