Mediation
The doctors are refusing to sign. The health minister says the process is not over. The mediation deadline is Thursday.
Last weekend, the Luxembourg Association of Doctors and Dentists (AMMD) announced it will not sign a new convention with the National Health Fund (CNS). The AMMD terminated the existing agreement last autumn and entered negotiations for a new text. Those talks, they say, have failed to deliver meaningful reform. Neither the CNS nor the government coalition has shown willingness to modernise the health system, according to the association.
Health Minister Martine Deprez sees it differently. She expressed surprise at the AMMD's announcement, noting that the mediation process is still ongoing. The mediator has not yet concluded her work and is still waiting for feedback from both parties. The official deadline is Thursday.
The AMMD's position is clear regardless. The association accuses the CNS and the government of failing to signal any real readiness for change, even after direct exchanges with both Minister Deprez and Prime Minister Luc Frieden.
Deprez rejects the criticism. She insists the negotiations were centred on the convention, but what they want to achieve cannot be resolved within that framework. She says proposals remain on the table and the government is willing to continue discussions.
The current convention expires at the end of October. After that, everything previously governed by the agreement will be regulated via a new Grand Ducal regulation, which still needs to be drafted. For patients, nothing will change immediately.
But the conventional framework is more flexible, Deprez explains. It allows AMMD representatives to negotiate directly with the CNS, proposing clarifications or amendments to specific articles. A regulation reduces that flexibility.
For the AMMD, this is not a viable long-term solution. Without a convention, AMMD president Chris Roller warns that Luxembourg risks moving towards a fully state-run healthcare system.
The CNS has not issued any public comment.
So: the doctors say mediation has failed. The minister says it has not ended. The deadline is Thursday. The convention expires in October. And the patient is left waiting.