Solidaritatea Sanitara Federation plans protests in Capital and other cities on January 14

The Executive Bureau of the Solidaritatea Sanitara Federation on Tuesday decided to initiate the procedure regarding the organisation of large-scale protests and established the calendar of the first actions of this type, according to a press release sent to AGERPRES. Thus, between January 7-9, 2021, all member unions will hand over, in the territory, memoranda in support of the demands of the Solidaritatea Sanitara Federation to MPs, and on January 14 protests will be organized at the local level, in each county, in front of the prefectures and also in Victoriei Square in Bucharest. The Executive Bureau has also decided to urgently convene the Coordination Council, on January 6, 2021, which will establish the long-term actions of the organization, taking into account all possible forms of protest. The demands of the trade unionists target the adoption of all necessary measures for the protection of the health and safety of health workers (equipment, circuits, material and human resources, etc.), so as to lead to a significant reduction in the number of employees newly infected with SARS-CoV-2, and of deaths due to COVID-19. Measures should include: developing an appropriate campaign to inform health workers about vaccination, setting standards for the duration of use of personal protective equipment and ensuring them in the required quantity and quality, developing staff regulations appropriate to the treatment of COVID-19 patients, reducing the continuous working time in personal protective equipment to 3 hours, the inclusion of COVID-19 as an occupational disease for health workers, observance of the legal right to a retirement pension for the children of colleagues who died on duty. Health trade unionists also demand an increase in basic salaries for all categories of employees, starting with January 1, 2021, at the level provided by the Pay Law for 2022. Cancellation of the cut in basic salaries provided by GEO No. 226/2020, relating all bonuses of health workers to current basic salaries and granting all bonuses for working conditions at the maximum level, granting the risk incentive for the entire duration of the pandemic for all healthcare employees, granting all salary rights provided by law, namely the increase of up to 30 percent, the hazard pay for fighting the epidemic and the payment of overtime, for all workers who have not yet benefited from them, the payment of guards with the hourly rate corresponding to the basic norm, upgrading the nurses' place within the salary grade so as to correspond to the place they have in the medical team, and to the contribution to the patients' treatment and care and the possibility for health workers to benefit from the reduction of the contribution period (retirement age) proportional to the activity carried out above the basic norm. The Federation of "Sanitary Solidarity" is a representative organization at the level of the Healthcare sector, having as members over 25,000 employees in this sector. The actions of the federation are carried out for the defence and promotion of the rights of the workers in the health sector, further mentions the release. AGERPRES (RO - author: Nicoleta Gherasi, editor: Oana Tilica; ; EN - author: Simona Iacob, editor: Cristina Zaharia)