Harare - Striking hospital doctors in Zimbabwe vowed to stay off the job until government acceded to their demands for better pay conditions to help cushion them against the effects of 11.3 million per cent inflation.

The nationwide strike began Wednesday over the doctors demands to be paid in foreign currency instead of the nearly worthless Zimbabwe dollar.

Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors Association (HDA) chairman Amon Siveregi told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa the doctors would continue the industrial action until government came to the table.

"We notified them on Monday that our situation had forced us to down tools but we are yet to get a response from them," said Siveregi.

Minister of Health David Parirenyatwa said the government was unable to keep up with galloping inflation, which shot up from 2.2 million per cent in May to 11.3 million per cent in June, but is thought to be really much higher.

"From time to time we review their salaries but at times we cannot cope up with the ever escalating cost of living," he said.

A visit to three government hospitals in Harare province - Parirenyatwa, Harare Central and Chitungwiza showed that some patients had not been attended to by doctors since Tuesday, thus further paralyzing a health system that is on its knees.

The exodus of health personnel abroad, the ravages of the HIV/AIDS pandemic and the failure by President Robert Mugabe's government to import essential medical drugs and equipment have aggravated the situation.

While refusing to say how much he was paid Siveregi assured: "Our demands are very reasonable. We just want to be paid a decent salary."

"I wish these doctors would just continue working while the government look at their concerns," said Theresa Marimwe, a woman whose four-year-old daughter Grace to Chitungwiza hospital, is suff from cholera and looked pale and exhausted.

"She has a running tummy. I wonder if she will get a prescription," Marimwe said with concern.

Zimbabwe's doctors, among the best trained in Africa but also among the worst paid, earn a starting salary of 680 Zimbabwe dollars a month - just enough to buy three loaves of bread. (dpa)