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However, medical and nursing workers emphasize that far from all workers with coronavirus infection in the workplace they receive 77.58 percent more. sickness benefit up to the amount of salary. Health professionals point out that when COVID-19 is infected by a colleague, the greatest disability benefit does not accrue to employees, and when a patient is suspected of being infected, the circumstances of the infection are, in their opinion , generally very difficult to solve. try.
Nursing professionals approached SAM
Lithuanian Organization of Nursing Specialists (LSSO) January 19. approached the Ministry of Health with a request to draw attention to the recent problem in the nursing community, which is that workers who can be infected by patients at work do not receive increased disability benefit.
“Earlier this year, we very often began receiving calls from nurses who were suspected of being infected with COVID-19 in the workplace and those who were simply unable to work were not receiving the maximum disability benefit for infected employees. at work, but lower, “Eltai said. The president of LSSO, Aušra Volodkaitė.
“Our request: if the workers really got infected in the workplace and really came into contact with a patient with COVID-19, so that they could receive the maximum salary,” he emphasized.
The LSSO president noted that coronavirus-infected nurses who work in the COVID-19 ward receive greater benefits, but nurses who work in other wards generally do not receive a greater benefit.
“Nurses working in other departments that can also be accessed by COVID-19 patients do not treat it as an occupational disease or as a workplace infection. Although a patient in urgent need of dialysis also enters the dialysis room and, for example, after a while, the responses to the tests show that it was a patient with COVID-19 and disease, “he said.
Although A. Volodkaitė states that nurses work in compliance with safety requirements, at the same time he emphasizes that “there is no single personal protection measure that is 100% effective. ensure efficiency “.
The president of the LSSO assures that the organization she leads has approached Sodra to find out how the nursing staff who may be infected by the patient should behave. However, he said no employee-friendly solutions have been received so far.
“There is a certain individual assessment and Sodra employees address both the doctor who issued the certificate of incapacity for work and the institution itself, explaining how the working conditions are. But so far, that 100 percent. It would be resolved in favor of the employee, I still do not know of such a case. Perhaps they are still under consideration, “he said.
More detailed regulation is missing
Aldona Baublytė Eltai, president of the Lithuanian Health Workers’ Union (LSADPS), also stated that the recent deterioration in the epidemiological situation has led to an increase in the number of doctors who do not have sufficient evidence to justify infection at work. and therefore you cannot claim higher disability benefits.
Regarding this issue, it is not only an injury for doctors, but also for employees of the public order and of the educational system who are actively working, because the free benefit that is provided to them lacks the evidence that employers they must toast, “.
“Entrepreneurs do not send documents to the Board of the State Social Security Fund that support the performance of professional activities and the causal link, as it is necessary to formalize the supporting documents. And necessarily, when a certificate of incapacity for work is issued, they must state that it is an occupational disease, “he added.
A. Baublytė admitted that the union doctors under her direction requested a higher disability benefit, trying to justify the infection at work, but according to her, the request was granted only to a very small part of the employees.
The president of LSADPS believes that the problem in this situation is the insufficiently detailed regulation of occupational infections.
“There is a lack of more detailed regulation. I also fully understand employers, because there are no specialized services to investigate the access point locally and identify who was infected by it, to be clear. Large institutions still have specialists in health and safety or infection control doctors, and the smaller institutions don’t have them, ”he said.
A. Baublytė also points out that doctors infected with his colleague’s coronavirus do not even have the opportunity to claim a higher disability benefit.
“For example, I accepted a patient and I got infected from a patient, a nurse works with me in the same office, she got sick later because she got infected from me or from the same patient. If we have evidence from the same patient, then she will receive a greater benefit. But if he interacted with a colleague from the same office and he contacted me that he had direct contact with the patient, he would no longer receive those benefits because the benefit is also limited to direct contact with the sick patient, ”said the union. President, emphasizing that this procedure was not correct in her opinion.
Sodra follows employer approval when awarding sickness benefit
Sodra, for his part, informed Elta that this year alone around 3,500 certificates of incapacity for work were issued when COVID-19 was considered an occupational disease. Such certificates of disability can be issued not only to doctors, but also, according to Saulius Jarmalis, Sodra’s head of communication, the amount of sickness benefit varies from person to person, so it is currently not possible to say professional activities .
“When a doctor issues a certificate of incapacity to work with the cause of an occupational disease and indicates the corresponding disease code, Sodra requests the employer through the electronic service system to the policy holder a document confirming whether the employee has temporarily incapacitated due to emergency work or quarantine, “said Eltai S. Jarmalis, the communication chief of” Sodra “.
It also reported that after the employer confirms that the employee has been temporarily unable to work due to an emergency situation or professional activities during the quarantine, Sodra pays 77.58 percent. amount of sickness benefit. If the employer does not confirm the person’s illness while performing professional duties, it indicates that the employee has not been in contact with COVID-19 patients at work, the usual 62.06 percent is paid. amount of sickness benefit.
Sodra follows employer approval (or not) when awarding benefits. It is not necessary to deliver documents to the employee to Sodra or to prove the circumstances of the infection ”, he assured.
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