German health professionals staged protests in various cities on Wednesday, demanding more funding for hospitals.
In Berlin, several hundred protesters took part in a rally organized by the German Hospital Federation, protesting against the government's health reform plans and austerity measures.
The president of the federation, Gerald Gass, told Anadolu that the hospitals could face a wave of bankruptcies in the coming months due to financial problems.
"Hospitals are in a dramatic economic situation at the moment, we urgently need fair financing conditions. Only in this way can we ensure that hospitals in Germany do not close and be able to take care of patients without interruption", he said.
Gass said that in the first half of this year, more than 50 hospitals filed for bankruptcy, twice as many as in the same period last year.
During the rally in Berlin, health professionals chanted slogans against Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Finance Minister Christian Lindner and Health Minister Karl Lauterbach.
They carried placards with messages such as "Lauterbach, Lindner, Scholz, wake up", "Stop closing hospitals" and "Equal working conditions for all".
Barbara Majd Amin, a protester, criticized the government for spending billions on armaments but not allocating the necessary funds to the health sector.
"The government approved a special fund of 100 billion euros to buy more tanks and ammunition, but says it will not be able to find 10 billion euros for hospitals! This should be protested by everyone", she said./AA/
