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GENEVA: Many nurses caring for COVID-19 patients suffer from burnout or psychological distress, and many have faced abuse or discrimination outside of work, the International Council of Nurses (ICN) said.
Supplies of personal protective equipment for nurses and other healthcare workers in some nursing homes remain insufficient, it said, on the occasion of World Mental Health Day on Saturday (October 10).
“We are very concerned about the impact on nurses’ mental health,” Howard Catton, a British nurse who is the executive director of ICN, told Reuters Television at the association’s Geneva headquarters.
“Our most recent survey of national nurses associations shows that more than 70 percent of them (the associations) said that nurses had been subjected to violence or discrimination and are therefore very concerned about extreme cases of distress psychological and pressure on mental health, “he said.
The figure was based on responses from about a quarter of their national nurses associations in more than 130 countries.
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Nurses face a wide spectrum of problems that affect their mental health, including physical and verbal abuse, Catton said.
“There are nurses who have been discriminated against, where the landlord has not renewed the lease of their apartment, or they cannot get child care for their children,” he said, without giving details of physical or verbal abuse.
ICN has lobbied for better protection and working conditions for nurses on the front lines of the pandemic.
“We continue to see problems with supplies of personal protective equipment. There have been improvements, particularly in hospitals,” Catton said.
But some nursing homes and long-term care facilities in Europe and North and South America still lack supplies, he said, citing the survey of their members.
The World Health Organization said last Monday that services for patients with mental illness and substance abuse have been disrupted around the world during the pandemic, and COVID-19 is expected to cause further distress for many.
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