The Andalusian Health Service (SAS) offered 203 positions for Family Doctors in Primary Care in the province of Malaga, including interim and long-term substitution roles. However, only 43 of these positions were accepted, representing a coverage rate of 21.18 percent, as reported by the Medical Union of Malaga. This situation, according to the union, highlights "the profound rejection that Primary Care currently generates" among new specialists.
The issue is even more critical in Pediatric Primary Care, where out of 23 available positions, only two were accepted, resulting in a coverage rate of 9 percent and leaving over 90 percent of posts vacant. The Medical Union believes these figures are not isolated incidents and add to a SAS public employment offer where, allegedly, more than half of the positions for Family Medicine and Pediatric Primary Care could remain unfilled.
The union states that the problem is no longer a lack of job offers from the Andalusian health system, but rather an inability to provide attractive working conditions for doctors. "An increasing number of physicians are rejecting the opportunity to build their professional careers in Primary Care due to working conditions they consider 'incompatible with the practice of quality medicine'," the statement reads.
The results from the latest employment offer confirm, in the union's view, "a repeated failure of specialist recruitment and retention policies." They add that "Andalusia trains excellent specialists but is incapable of offering them sufficiently attractive conditions to remain within its public health system."
