Health workers struggle to make ends meet

paid. “They must call our office and narrate their stories so we can pick up on this issue.”

For one doctor, he is too scared to look how far he has fallen behind on his home loan.

He worked at the Dr Elizabeth Mamisa Chabula-Nxiweni Field Hospital, but eventually left a month ago after he was owed one month’s salary, of which he netted R32,000.

At the same time he had worked overtime.

“I am just waiting for the sheriff at this point,” he said, declining to be named.

“The department gives you a letter for your creditors but the creditors don’t care.”

The doctor, who struggled to hold back tears, said he had received repeated calls from debt collectors and he planned to return to a small private practice.

“I don’t know how the other doctors are surviving,” he said.

“At this point I don’t even have a medical aid because I can’t afford the premiums.”

He said in just one month he had clocked more than 300 hours in overtime.

The doctor, who said he felt used, said he had eventually been placed on leave as he had surpassed his contractual hours, only to be called back due to others being booked off sick.

“All they [the department] care about now is the vaccine rollout and they forgot about us who put our lives on the line. It has been a fight from the word go.

“It is inhumane what they are doing to us,” the doctor said.

Another doctor at the field hospital said they had not been paid for January.

“Generally there is no communication as to when the time sheets need to be in.

“The roster was chaotic and in terms of administration we had no idea who to report to.

“Luckily, I am not dependent on the money.”

A third doctor, who was also not paid, said they had been informed that their salaries for January and February would reflect in their bank account in the first week of March.

Contract nurses at the filed hospital also claim they have not been paid overtime allowances since starting their jobs.

In addition, salaries were also not always paid on time. which left them to fight with creditors.

A nurse, who declined to be named out of fear of hindering future employment prospects, said even though they were waiting to hear about overtime, their main gripe was fulltime employment.

Many of the nurses have been left shortchanged by thousands of rand as their full salaries were never paid out in full.

After a meeting on Friday, she said the department had promised to pay overtime allowances in the first two weeks of March.

“HR said they were busy processing [overtime] allowances for which I haven’t been paid since last year July.”

She said the department had rushed to hire nurses at the start of the epidemic.

“When I went to sign the contract they did not explain anything. They just showed us our salaries and you are given five minutes to read the important paragraphs. Then you sign.”

Before taking up work at the field hospital, she worked as a full-time nurse in ICU at a private hospital.

“I always wanted to work in the public sector [and] I thought they would absorb us knowing the gross shortage of nurses, but the department, especially Nelson Mandela Bay district, do not care.

“They don’t care about my wellbeing. I will be forced to drink sugar water and they will sit in restaurants and dine.

“Who will look after my family’s needs? My life is hanging by a thread and I feel very insecure. We have bond payments,” she said.

Another field hospital nurse, said her January salary had been paid late and she was also owed overtime.

A third nurse said she had not been paid overtime since she started in December.

A fourth nurse had not received her January salary and said she was struggling to pay school fees.

“How can we put our lives on the line and then not be paid?

“How heartless must a department be to treat us as slaves?”

Eastern Cape department of health spokesperson Sizwe Kupelo said absorbing Covid-19 contract workers across the board was being discussed at national level.

“There is no money or budget available from the equitable share. The money came from the National Disaster Fund,” Kupelo said.

The contracts of contract nurses were different from permanent nursing staff, Kupelo said.

“If you are on contract you get an additional 37% on top of your salary, so they don’t qualify for overtime.”

Meanwhile, more doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine were expected in the province this week for frontline workers, the department said.

By February 24, 3,041 healthcare workers had already received the jab in the province as part of the trial.