On December 5th, students and doctors together in the square for healthcare

Unified demonstration in Rome on 5 December "to defend the right to treatment and the future of the National Health Service". The women and men of public health will be mobilised: doctors, veterinarians, nurses, midwives, health professions, technicians, administrators, students, medical and non-medical specialists, researchers, together with their professional and trade union representatives. The procession leaves at 3pm from Piazza Vittorio Emanuele II and arrives in Via dei Fori Imperiali.

A united front, explain the organizers - 27 acronyms between unions and associations - "without distinctions of role or union acronym, takes to the streets to defend the right to treatment and the future of the National Health Service". The NHS, they say, "belongs to everyone: to those who care every day and to those who need to be cared for. Today this common good is weakened by years of policies characterized by insufficient investments in the health of the population and by a poor valorisation of hospital, outpatient, territorial, training and research staff. It is the citizens who pay the price, that is, all of us". And again: "To those who work and study in healthcare we say: you are not alone. To those waiting for a visit, hospitalization or assistance we say: it cannot be a lottery. Health cannot depend on income or postal code of residence: there is the right to treatment and the right to cure". On 5 December, we read in the joint note, "public health will be there to make itself heard, demonstrating with the pride of being the National Health Service and with the firm awareness that the system must be defended and strengthened. What drives the mobilization are the hope and determination to make all this still possible, because we are and will be the NHS". The initiative is open to all citizens who want to take to the streets "to defend public health".