World IN BRIEF : UGANDA : 57 Die as Medical Strike Continues

Fifty-seven people have died in Ugandan hospitals and clinics due to lack of care since doctors and nurses went on strike Tuesday for higher wages, their union said. But Health Minister James Makumbi, himself a doctor, ruled out talks and accused strikers of gross irresponsibility. Makumbi called the strike illegal and said the government would only talk to the doctors and nurses once they had returned to work, a condition dismissed by the union. The union wants doctors, who currently make about $155 a month, to be paid as much as $1,565 a month, and nurses to be paid as much as $520 a month from just $62 at present.