Riot police have scuffled with medical staff at an Athens public hospital, after dozens of staff gathered to protest the state of public health services during a visit to the hospital by the country’s prime minister

ATHENS — ATHENS (AP) — Riot police scuffled with medical staff at an Athens public hospital on Wednesday during a protest over the state of public health services held during a visit to the facility by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.

Police in riot gear fired volleys of pepper spray and used shields and batons to push away doctors at the University General Hospital Attikon who were demanding to meet with Mitsotakis, local media reported. The health workers were protesting staff shortages, low pay and poor working conditions.

Mitsotakis, accompanied by Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis, was visiting the hospital in western Athens to attend the inauguration of a new oncology department and visit the refurbished emergency department.

“They think we’re going to thank them because they owe us 10,000 days of leave. They think we’re going to thank them for keeping our salaries frozen,” said Giorgos Sideris, head of the Association of Hospital Doctors of Athens and Piraeus.

Sideris, a doctor at the hospital, said 130 patients had recently been sleeping on stretchers in corridors due to overcrowding and that an extra 125 nursing staff was urgently needed “just to operate at safety level.”

The hospital’s new oncology ward was built with funding from a charity organization, and is expected to care for more than 20,000 patients per year, a 41% increase from 2019, the prime minister’s office said.

Speaking during the inauguration, Mitsotakis said regular funding for Attikon had increased from 90 million euros ($104.5 million) 150 million euros. Staffing levels had also increased, he said, “not to the level that we’d like, but we continue to insist on this great effort to comprehensively restructure the National Health System.”