Thousands of medical staff held street rallies and strike meetings across France on Thursday to protest against low wages and government reforms they say will create a profit-orientated, two-tier public health service.
Two weeks ahead of regional polls seen as a test of the government's reform drive, health workers demanded more jobs and the withdrawal of a plan to shake-up hospital finances by 2007.
Many hospital staff stayed at work to provide a minimum service, said union leaders explaining the low turnout. Paris police said 1,500 had rallied in the capital's Bastille area.
"Personally, I'm against one-day strikes. If I'm going to go on strike it'll be for a week or a fortnight," said nurse Odile during her rounds at the nearby Quinze-Vingts eye hospital.
She said there were issues to consider in the health system but "I can't afford to strike, I've got loans to repay".
The protest came as power workers voted to extend a strike against privatisation of the national Electricite de France utility and follows protests by thousands of leading scientists over low research funding.
Health Minister Jean-Francois Mattei, under fire after 15,000 mainly elderly people died in a heatwave last summer, said reforms were vital to save a health insurance systems that ran up a 10 billion euro ($12.30 billion) deficit in 2003.