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Dealing with exhaustive changes and the risk of contamination is not enough. Health professionals in Rio de Janeiro also have to worry about a number of problems, including wage arrears during the new coronavirus pandemic.
Protective equipment fights that are often inadequate, wrong payrolls, reduced rest hours, and staff shortages in crowded patient rooms are just a few items on the list.
This image is completed by doctors and nurses who go to work even with symptoms for fear of losing their wages and who improvise solutions to the lack of public resources, in addition to those who have been away from the family for more than a month.
Doctor Pedro (not his real name) realized this last week, when he experienced a shooting while deciding what to do with oxygen-free patients at the Manguinhos family clinic. “I thought: it looks like Italy. But reality reminded me that this is not Italy. Besides Covid, there are other things that make our drama so much bigger, ”he says.
The delay in wages is the reality of at least three state UPAs (Emergency Care Units) in the capital of Rio de Janeiro, in Copacabana, Botafogo and Taquara. The payment for the last 50 days worked should have fallen on the 20th, but so far nothing.
Faced with uncertainty, the doctors “announce” their shifts in a WhatsApp group: “UPA Copacabana, tomorrow 4/29, 12:00 pm, red room. Someone interested? “One asks per message. Since they are hired as PJs (legal entities), they only earn when they work.
There have also been reports of professionals who continue to do their jobs even with symptoms of Covid-19, so as not to lose their pay or have discounts for absences, in the case of bidders.
“Yesterday, a doctor came to work with symptoms, dyspnea (shortness of breath), cough […] so as not to lose the 80% bonus that we have in our salary. […] He was unmasked for at least two hours sassarando by the unit […]. Stress at the highest level ”, writes a Baixada Fluminense doctor.
While some do not receive a salary, others receive it by mistake, such as family clinics in the south and in northern areas (Maré, Alemão, Penha and Madureira). In a Rocinha unit, payment was reduced by 25-30%, and some nurses and technicians have already been absent due to delays in food stamps and transportation vouchers.
There, doctors even had to teach cleaners without training to clean. “Between caring for patients, setting up tents, printing papers (on a sheet already used because there is no blank sheet) and trying to organize with colleagues who get sick, we need to stop and train the cleaning girls,” says one of them, and adds that more than half of them already got sick.
The lack of protective equipment (PPE), which has been criticized since the start of the pandemic, has even caused fights between different sectors of the hospitals. “There are many conflicts between colleagues who say they will not enter the room [para atender pacientes com Covid]”Says Luciene da Silva, 47, a nursing technician at the Federal Hospital in Bonsucesso.
“The X-ray clerk says he wants a mask, but the infirmary doesn’t have it for everyone. The company that hires makeup artists is also not supplying. The makeup artist refuses to transport the patient because he does not have equipment, “he exemplifies.
And even when the worker gets the PPE, its quality is questionable. Several units complain about the thickness of the aprons, which should be waterproof, but they are not. A nursing technician at the Federal Hospital Cardoso Fontes threw alcohol on the tissue and took a photo showing that the liquid passes through it.
These failures contribute to the large number of infected people. More than 2,200 health professionals have already been dismissed for suspicion or confirmation of the disease in the state and municipal networks of RJ. 15 nurses and technicians and 11 doctors died in the state as of Tuesday (28), according to the Cofen and Cremerj nursing and medical councils.
Employees are also dissatisfied because, presenting symptoms of the disease, they have been unable to attend the hospitals where they work. They need to join the common queue, like any citizen, to get a bed.
“I understand that they will ask, ‘Why should you have the privilege?’ Because I took care of you, only now that I am sick, “defends coach André Luiz da Silva, 46, of Bonsucesso.
With the lack of professionals compounded by sick leave and the growing demand for patients, the remaining employees are extremely overburdened. The Cardoso Fontes hospital, for example, decided to reduce rest hours by 30 minutes.
“But yesterday [segunda] nobody could rest. She has no human resources and does not stop arriving for a patient, “says technician Chris Gerardo. After being infected and staying 14 days away, she returned to work in a space that used to house 6 beds but now houses 23, the so-called” covidário “, with critically ill patients.
It all comes together with family distance. Despite living with her mother, Luciene de Bonsucesso’s technique divided the rooms into which each one can enter. That’s because his mother is 77 years old and has chronic lung disease. Additionally, the employee started wearing a mask at home and doing a thorough cleaning after using the only bathroom in the residence.
Family doctor García Vergara, 52, was able to make a more drastic decision. “43 days ago, I took my wife and two young children to their farm in Freiburg. I have not seen them since. If they got sick from me, it would collapse, ”he says.
SECRETARY OF HEALTH SAYS THAT WAGES WILL BE PAID
The RJ State Department of Health, under the administration of Wilson Witzel (PSC), stated that the back wages of the UPAs in Copacabana, Botafogo and Taquara must be paid on Monday (4), once they are transferred to the social organization that manages the units have already been authorized.
The portfolio also denied that the remuneration of health professionals is suspended when they are eliminated due to the confirmation or suspicion of Covid-19.
Regarding the error in the payments made by the employees of the family clinics, the Municipal Health Secretariat, under the direction of Marcelo Crivella (republicans), reported that the complaints are evaluated individually and the differences are resolved in the following month. Delays in transportation and food stamps, according to the agency, have already been paid.
The folder replied that “it is not true” that the aprons used are permeable, with a thickness less than that recommended. “All the PPE available in the units, including the layers, are within the specifications of Anvisa’s technical standard No. 04/2020 and the secretariat’s protocols.”
Regarding the lack of training for cleaning women at the Rocinha health clinic, the agency said the responsibility for training and supplying PPE lies with the outsourced company, but the workers also receive guidance from unit management. .
In the federal network, the directors of the Bonsucesso and Cardoso Fontes hospitals declared that they adopt all the protocols of the WHO and the Ministry of Health, that the teams are being trained in the use of PPE and that the aprons used are waterproof and certified by Anvisa.
