The Costa Rican Social Security Service (CCSS) announced at 10:15 a.m. that some of the services at public hospitals have “unfortunately” been affected by the general strike “it’s variable, we cannot generalize”, stated Román Macaya, president of CCSS during the press conference today.

“We have declared an institutional emergency, this will give us access to an emergency fund, that will facilitate administrative contracting. We also presented at 8:26 a.m. this morning the request to declare this strike illegal, precisely because health is an essential service and we cannot play with this”, said Macaya.

Macaya also highlighted the work and disposition of all the employees that were working normally and called on all those that joined the strike to reconsider their actions and reminded them of the Hippocratic oath they took. “There is no biggest expression of solidarity than caring for another human being in a moment of crisis”.

According to Macaya, the nurses’ department is one where many employees have joined the strike, which is affecting surgeries and other services due to being short-staffed. One of the hospitals that have suffered the most inconveniences is the San Juan de Dios Hospital in San Jose which had 60 surgeries scheduled that had to be canceled.

The emergency fund is of close to $50 million USD and it comes from a reserve fund that is collected since 2016 by a decision of the Board of Directors precisely to face situations like this one.

Authorities of the CCSS stated that all patients that have appointments already scheduled should go to the hospital as planned.