Nurses renew call for PPE, isolation pay
If police officers are supplied bulletproof vests without question and firefighters are given protective gear, why do some nurses and front-line healthcare staff have to scrounge for PPE during a pandemic?
That’s what Julianne Morosin wants to know.
She’s one of thousands of Ontario nurses and health-care workers who took part in Monday’s Blue Ribbon Movement, a social media day of action.
They’re calling on the province to provide all health-care workers equitable access to full personal protective equipment as they care for people ill with COVID-19. They also want the province to restore pay for health-care workers forced to miss work and self-isolate after being exposed to the coronavirus.
“We as nurses cannot strike, we cannot work to rule,” said Morosin, who lives in Niagara and is a registered nurse working in Level 3 intensive care. “So we need to get the attention of the provincial government to say ‘Hey, we have some issues here. And we need help.’ ”
Unable so far, they’re hoping the public will join their call.
On Monday, they asked people to show support by tying a royal blue ribbon to their car antenna and to post Facebook and Instagram messages using tags like# protect your nurses and# your healthcare workers and to tag @Fordnation to get the premier’s attention.
As a hospital-based nurse, Morosin said, access to adequate PPE isn’t as big of an issue as it is for staff in long-termcare homes, although “we definitely conserve, conserve, conserve” knowing it was in short supply early in the pandemic.
In some nursing homes, she said, the problem goes beyond conserving — “that’s not even an option, and I think that’s what we’re fighting for now.”
Not providing that protection, and not compensating workers ordered to stay home, she said, seems counter to the goal of containing spread of the virus.
“The employer has a duty to protect you, and if the employer isn’t getting enough from the provincial or federal government then that’s a huge issue,” she said.
During the first COVID-19 wave early last summer, the province directed health-care staff exposed to the coronavirus were to be paid while they isolated at home. That plan expired,
and hospital systems reverted to sick-pay provisions outlined in collective agreements with their unions.
Generally, a worker who was exposed to COVID-19 and ordered to self-isolate is not considered sick if they show no symptoms and haven’t received a negative test result. Private long-term-care operators can decide for themselves whether to pay isolating employees.
Morosin said in some cases, that forces the worker to “choose between feeding your family and doing what’s right, and maybe not everyone is going to make the right choice.”
Recently, Alberta restored pay for RNS forced to isolate and miss work after being exposed.
Questions sent to Ontario’s Health Ministry Monday were referred to the Ministry of Labour. By press time, there was no response.
Like other Ontario hospital systems, Niagara Health resumed regular leave-payment practices when the province ended its direction to pay staff who were isolating.
However, it has been “actively advocating to advance discussions regarding government compensation for staff and physicians” forced to self-isolate, said Flo Paladino, executive vice-president for people and organizational development.
“We are truly grateful for their unwavering commitment during these uncertain times as we respond to the COVID-19 pandemic,” she said in a statement.
Morosin said during the first wave, when COVID-19 was still new, she feared bringing it home with her from work and lived apart from the rest of her family in a downstairs in-law suite.
“We are a resilient group and we always will be, as nurses, but if people knew what it was like, I think that they would be afraid. And I think that they would play by the rules and stay at home,” she said.
“Us having to go to work every day and be with COVID patients every single day, that’s stressful enough — to be there, to hold their hand as they die, to cheer them on as they’re getting better.
“I don’t need the stress of, ‘If I’m home will I be paid?’ or ‘Will I have access and my friends and colleagues have access (to PPE).’ I don’t need that added stress, it’s too much.”