Growing Strong
Nurse and Midwives By Mayla Meru The Liberal government has spent months convincing the public that the health system is fully capable of handling the current rise of COVID cases. It is more apparent every day that it is not. Within weeks of Dominic Perrottet taking over as Premier of NSW, it became clear that the government would be further moving its focus to the economy rather than public health and well being. This decision was evident when the NSW government refused to implement health orders to slow down the spread of Omicron. Instead, Perrottet passed the baton of care to the public under the guise of ‘personal responsibility.’
that due to the high number of health workers that are close contacts or COVID positive, many nurses and midwives are being forced to cancel annual leave, work overtime and regularly work double-shifts. These conditions put immense physical and mental pressure on essential workers and places both workers and patients in danger. Despite demands for change, the NSW premier has continued to declare that the NSW health system “remains strong”. This statement does not reflect the reality of the current working conditions for NSW nurses and midwives. Most recently on the 19th of January, a protest was held at Sydney’s Westmead hospital demanding action. Westmead staff are being pressured to take on excessive amounts of overtime, work up to 20 hour long double shifts, and are often unable to take proper breaks. The NSWNMA is demanding the government be honest with the public and “concede the health system is not coping”.
Letting the Omicron variant rip through the community is informed by ableist ideologies. Those who are chronically ill and disabled, those who are at the highest risk of contraction, serious illness and death from the virus, are treated as disposable. Their deaths, discounted. This policy approach has been rightfully described as indirect eugenics.
Throughout the pandemic, the NSWNMA has campaigned for safe nurse-to-patient ratios (one-to-four on ward floors, oneto-three in emergency wards and one-toone in ICU), a wage increase of 4.7%, and pandemic pay. The NSW government has ignored these calls, instead insultingly
On the 19th of January NSW COVID hospitalization rates reached a new high of 2,863. The New South Wales Nurses and Midwives’ Association [NSWNMA] spoke out about the impact of these hospitalization rates on public hospitals. They explained 23
