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STRIKES

Huge disruption to flights, despite French air traffic controllers calling off strike

Travellers are braced for massive disruption on Thursday with around half of flights in and out of France cancelled, despite air traffic controllers calling off their strike at the last minute. Budget airline Ryanair says that it has also been forced to cancel 300 flights passing over France.

Huge disruption to flights, despite French air traffic controllers calling off strike
Air traffic controllers have called off their strike. Photo by BORIS HORVAT / AFP

The SNCTA union had called a 24-hour strike on Thursday, April 25th in a dispute over changes to working patterns.

The strongly supported strike was set to cause huge disruption, but on Wednesday morning the union announced that last-minute talks had been successful and “an agreement has been reached”.

The SNCTA strike notice for Thursday has now been lifted, but disruption is still likely on Thursday, especially at Paris airports.

It is expected that 75 percent of flights in and out of Paris Orly airport will be cancelled and 55 percent of flights at Paris Charles de Gaulle.

‘75% of flights cancelled’ – which airports are worst affected by Thursday’s disruption?

In addition to cancellations of flights in and out of French airports, the budget airline company Ryanair announced that over 300 of their flights set to fly over French airspace would also be cancelled. 

Ryanair said that around 50,000 passengers would be affected in some way, and the most disrupted flights would be those flying over France to get from the UK to Greece, Spain, and Italy.

The disruption is due to the last-minute nature of the strike cancellation, combined with the fact that smaller unions which had also filed a strike notice could still go ahead with Thursday’s walk-out.

People with flights booked for Thursday should check with their airline for possible delays or cancellations.

The SNCTA had also threatened to file strike notices over the May holiday weekend – on May 9th, 10th and 11th – but after reaching an agreement with management, the union withdrew its strike notice for these dates.

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STRIKES

Pharmacists in France to strike at the end of May

Unions representing French pharmacists have called for walkouts at the end of May in protest over drug shortages, wages and the sale of medication on the internet.

Pharmacists in France to strike at the end of May

The primary union, the union for community pharmacists (Union des syndicats de pharmaciens d’officine, or USPO) has called for on-call pharmacists to walk out during the Pentecost long-weekend (May 18th to 20th), and for all pharmacies across France to close on Thursday, May 30th.

On-call pharmacists (pharmacie de garde) are those working on Sundays and bank holidays (like Pentecost), as most other pharmacies close on these dates.

While it is still not clear how many pharmacists will walk out, the call for strikes is nationwide and it may be best to plan to pick up any important medicine ahead of time.

Why the strike?

Drug shortages are a large part of the problem because they reportedly force pharmacists to spend more of their working hours doing drug research to be able to offer alternatives to patients. 

Pierre-Olivier Variot, the head of the union for community pharmacists, told Franceinfo that this has led to an extra 12 hours of research time for the average pharmacy.

“These are 12 hours during which we cannot take care of patients. We’re also dealing with tired patients who are frustrated we do not have their treatment,” he said.

Variot also explained that wages have not kept up with inflation, and as a result some pharmacies have had to close. 

Unions are also calling for the French government to better regulate the sale of medication on the internet, in order to ensure quality and safety standards.

Why the shortage of medicines?

The issue has been longstanding, and the situation was made worse during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The French Medicines Safety Agency (ANSM) reported that, in 2023, it had 4,925 medicines either out of stock or at risk of being out of stock, an increase of 30.9 percent in medicine shortages compared to 2022.

You can find the list of medications in short supply here.

A spokesperson from ANSM told Le Point in February that there are several things causing the problem, with many of them taking place on a global level.

“There are challenges with the manufacture of raw materials and finished products, as well as qualify defects in the drugs, insufficient production capacity, and division within the manufacturing stages,” the ANSM said.

On top of that, many factories dealing with raw materials are located outside of Europe.

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