“This is not the time for strikes or for salary increases,” says Cardinal Nicolas de Jesus Lopez Rodriguez, who declined to mediate the wage conflict between the Dominican Medical College (CMD) and the Ministry of Public Health. Hoy reports that the CMD has announced another three-day strike of the 147 public hospitals and clinics, as well as those belonging to the Social Security system. During the strike, only emergency care will be given, as well as attention to critically ill patients. The cardinal said that the medical professionals should wait until the country has straightened itself out economically before making their salary demands. He said that now was the time to repair the country, and not to go out on strike or make new wage demands. Lopez Rodriguez said furthermore that the country did not have the money to pay the 100% increase requested by the doctors. At the same time, the Dominican cardinal said that the proposed RD$17 billion allotment of the 2005 budget should be used to better the shameful condition of the country’s hospitals and public health facilities.