Review of pay given to Ministry of Health

Areview for nurses’ pay and allowances have been submitted to the Ministry of Health and Medical Services by the Fiji Nursing Association (FNA) and the chief medical nursing officer.

This was confirmed by the FNA president Dr Alisi Vunidiabola yesterday.

Dr Alisi said the FNA hoped the submission would be generated soon into a Cabinet paper for consideration.

She was not able to provide details of the submission because FNA did not want to pre-empt the content of the submission.

“The submissions were jointly produced by the nurses from Government and the FNA executives and are now with the Ministry of Health,” Dr Alisi said.

“Our prayers are with the Minister for Health who will present all our requests to Cabinet in good faith.

“We are also praying for God’s favour for our nurses as well.”

She said nurses had worked extremely hard to remain relevant and stay visible in a system that had truly forgotten about them. “Our nurses have given their all in the past three years; and more prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and we all know that many of them are already running on empty,” she said.

She said the FNA had only one request for its employer, and that was to “have the heart to look after their nurses”.

“The migration of nurses out of Fiji and out of nursing continues to worsen every day and this demands everyone’s wisdom and creativity in ensuring that the health services survive in its organisation and that the quality of care locally is not compromised.” Ministry of Health Permanent Secretary Dr James Fong yesterday confirmed that the ministry had received the submission.

“It came through my chief medical nursing officer, we reviewed it and because it was a bit narrow. We asked them to work on it a little more,” Dr Fong said.

“They want it to go through as a Cabinet paper, so we are having a final look before we can make a submission.”

The Fiji Nurses Association is the national voice of nursing personnel, advancing the practice of nursing and the profession to improve health outcomes, and advocating for better welfare for nursing.