Overview

• Hospital Público Materno Infantil reduced daily operations from 49 to 15 and postponed at least 300 scheduled procedures due to a lack of anesthesiologists.
• Care is limited to emergencies, cesareans and other urgent perinatal cases, pediatric emergencies, and the most pressing oncology surgeries.
• The anesthesiology association ASAAR disputes that surgeries were suspended for lack of staff, reporting 104 practitioners in the province including 18 residents.
• Managers at Oñativia and Papa Francisco say retirements left vacancies unfilled, forcing reliance on convenios that pay per procedure and strain budgets, with one medium or high‑complexity surgery equating to a full public doctor’s monthly salary.
• Materno Infantil’s manager cites exhausted staff and shortages for guard shifts, notes anesthesiologists there can earn roughly 3 to 11 million pesos monthly depending on duties, and provincial officials are pushing measures to expand training.