Hundreds of nurses and midwives of the public health system of Catalonia have demonstrated again this Monday in the center of Barcelona, almost a month after the start of an indefinite strike called by the Infermeres de Catalunya union – a minority in the sector and which is in disagreement with the signed agreement by the majority Satse-, to demand labor improvements.
The protest has started in two central points of the city, Plaza Universitat and Plaza Tetuán, which have come together on Gran Via, at the height of Pau Claris Street, from where it runs along Via Laietana to Plaza Sant Jaume, according to the planned route. ‘The system endures with our sacrifices. ‘Stop exploiting us’, ‘We nurses say enough is enough!’, ‘We are not low-cost personnel’ and ‘Vocation is not exploitation’ have been some of the slogans on the protest banners.
“We nurses want to work in good working conditions to offer the best cures to users and now, like every winter, we work with a very significant overload,” said Laia Marsal, vice president of the Infermeres de Catalunya union and pediatric nurse in a primary care center. “We cannot offer all the care in the way we would like and we do not have the hands or enough time to do it with the quality that is required,” she said.
The group demands from the Government a salary supplement equivalent to A1 to call off the indefinite strike that they are maintaining and, although they know that the competence lies with the central Government, they ask the Generalitat to create a homologation supplement that allows them to have the recognition that they have been demanding since long time.
The Government can apply the level supplements recognized in the public service but, until now, it has not done so and has hidden behind the fact that the salary supplement demanded by nurses depends on Madrid.
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This demonstration coincides with the start this Monday, of the indefinite strike of Health Technicians in Catalonia in the centers of the Catalan Health Institute (ICS), convened by the Union of Nursing Technicians (SAE) and the State Union of Higher Health Technicians (SIETeSS).
The protests and health strikes coincide these first days of January with the flu epidemic and the emergencies and consultations in Catalan health centers crowded with people sick with this disease, covid-19 and other respiratory viruses.