The Bolivian Medical Council announced yesterday a 24 hour strike to reject the government’s increase of their work day from six to eight hours without compensation. Health Minister Juan Carlos Calvimonte said that the bill was published last Monday and will be approved within 60 days. The President of the Medical Council, Alfonso Barrios said [...]

Bolivian President Evo Morales issued a decree yesterday morning that will enforce an eight-hour workday in the health sector, despite protests from health-care workers, who say that the shift from a six-hour workday would be too demanding. At a press conference, the new health minister, Juan Carlos Calvimontes, asked health-care workers to comply with the [...]

Three young Chileans were on vacation in Copacabana on the shores of Lake Titicaca when one of them, Sergio Gachón began feeling ill. In the small town hospital they prescribed Gachón penicillin without ascertaining that Gachón had a severe penicillin allergy. Gachón died later that day in his hostel. Gachón’s family said that this was [...]

The government has signed an accord with handicapped citizens who had been marching in protest. The accord will create a commission to study whether Bolivia can afford a monthly welfare payment to handicapped individuals. The marchers are asking for Bs. 3000 per month ($428 or roughly four times Bolivia’s minimum wage). The La Paz president [...]

The Bolivian government will install an industrial pant to produce mate–or tea–based on the coca leaf to be used by physicians in the treatment of diabetes and obesity. Germain Loza, the deputy minister of Coca and Integral Development, said that the project will produce mate from the dried leaves of the coca plant, which will [...]

The World Bank announced yesterday that it will invest US$250 million in Bolivian rural development and highway infrastructure projects. Oscar Avalle, the outgoing World Bank representative in Bolivia, met with Bolivian President Evo Morales yesterday to discuss development strategies and to introduce his successor, Faris Hadad Zervos, who will hold the post for the next [...]

Bolivian pharmacies have been prohibited from selling Tamiflu, the drug used against the A/H1N1 flu virus despite the prevalence and persistence of this strain in the country. Efraín Vallejos, Bolivia’s Director of Epidemiology said, “They could only sell it if there is a ministerial resolution, which we have already solicited, but there has still been [...]

A 7 year old girl who was bitten by her puppy is dying of rabies in Cochabamba hospital Pediátrico Manuel Ascencio Villarroel. Her parents did not know about the disease and thus did not seek medical attention until the virus had spread to her nervous system- a stage of rabies that is incurable and 100% [...]

Smoke from burning Amazonian fires has engulfed much of Bolivia in an annual tradition called the Chaqeo whereby farmers burn brush and forest to clear land. Many of the fires have burned out of control and at least 394 families had fled their homes as a result. The skies over major cities like Santa Cruz [...]

The Santa Cruz ombudsman, Hernan Cabrera, revealed this Wednesday that every two days nine women die of uterine disease and breast cancer in the eastern department of Santa Cruz—and that the diseases are among the leading causes of death for women across the country. Women are affected differently by the diseases depending on whether they [...]