More than 430 specialists have resigned from Paraguay’s public public health system following a five-day strike over wages and severe supply shortages.

The wave of departures has hollowed out high-complexity care, stripping the Acosta Ñu Children’s Hospital and the Trauma Hospital of pediatric surgeons, neurosurgeons, and anesthesiologists. Sinamed noted that all 39 pediatric surgeons in the public system have exited, while roughly 85% of pediatric intensive therapists at leading centers have also submitted resignations.

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Union secretary-general Rosana González argued that replacing the lost staff is unfeasible locally, pointing out that recruiting from neighboring Brazil is unrealistic given the salary floor there—40 million guaraníes against 5 million guaraníes in Paraguay. She described feeling “belittled” by the authorities and characterized the resignations as a direct reaction to that treatment, adding that the most highly trained subspecialists and specialists are the ones leaving.

The union’s formal demands cover salary readjustments, double pay for holidays, an end to precarious contracts for hired staff, guaranteed supplies, and upgraded conditions across hospitals and health posts. Specifically, Sinamed is pressing to raise the minimum monthly wage for a 12-hour weekly contract from approximately 728 euros to about 1,166 euros.

Precarious employment pervades the workforce: roughly 9,000 of the country’s nearly 11,000 public physicians lack definitive appointments. Although the Executive Branch authorized 11,100 new Ministry of Health positions—9,755 for health personnel—before the strike, the measure failed to halt the work stoppage.

Nearly 300 specialist and subspecialist doctors in Paraguay’s public health system are set to resign on Monday after a five-day strike failed to reach an agreement with the government of President Santiago Peña.

The mass resignations follow a week of industrial action by about… pic.twitter.com/wZk29xaNDI

— teleSUR English (@telesurenglish) August 31, 2026

The current rupture stems from long-standing grievances, with nursing unions and patient associations denouncing chronic shortages and depressed wages for months. The State’s accumulating debt to pharmaceutical firms, now exceeding one billion dollars, has severed the supply chain.

Sinamed has scheduled an extraordinary assembly in the coming days to determine whether to return to strike action, citing government silence from the Colorado Party administration. Meanwhile, the Executive has rolled out contingency plans and is scrutinizing the legal implications of each resignation.

Morning counts fluctuated between 198 and 220 formalized resignations before the union revised the figure upward past 300. The definitive count remains unsettled.

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