THE largest ever health care strike in Oregon continued today as thousands joined picket lines.

Some 5,000 hospital health care workers walked off the job on Friday as they picketed outside all eight Providence hospitals in Portland, Oregon, north-west United States.

Most of those participating in the strike are nurses. But in a rare move, dozens of doctors at a Portland hospital and at six women’s health clinics also walked out, making it the state’s first physicians’ strike, according to the Oregon Nurses Association union.