This Thursday the director of the San Juan de Dios Hospital in San Jose, Doctor Ileana Balmaceda, denounced the actions of the labor union that took over surgery rooms preventing oncology patients from getting programmed surgeries.

According to Balmaceda, members of the labor union were upset because the hospital arranged to get assistance from surgeons and professionals from the Puriscal clinic to handle some of the surgeries that have been piling up for patients in the areas of oncology and orthopedics; the plan was to go through with several surgeries this Thursday.

Balmaceda continued on to explain that the strikers chose to “hold an assembly” and took over the surgery rooms without authorization; in response, the administration of the hospital requested the presence of a public notary to file a formal minute of what was happening, when the notary arrived the strikers decided to leave, yet, they lost 2 hours of work in each of the surgery rooms.

Currently this hospital has 80 oncology patients whose surgeries have had to be rescheduled since the strike started.

President Carlos Alvarado warned that actions like the one that happened at the San Juan de Dios Hospital today “will not be tolerated” and instructed the Public Police Force to act if necessary at the request of the authorities of the Social Security Services.

Lenin Hernandez, secretary of SINAE labor union, denied the statements of Balmaceda in saying that they had taken the surgery rooms for two hours, although he accepted that they held an assembly to offer information to some members.