DOLE urged to stop sending nurses abroad amid effort vs COVID-19

Cagayan De Oro City Representative Rufus Rodriguez on Monday urged Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III to temporarily halt the overseas deployment of Filipino nurses while the Philippines grapples with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).

Rodriguez made the call after he read a news report stating that Germany was sending a plane to Manila to carry at least 75 intensive care unit nurses to take care of German nationals with COVID-19.

“Secretary Bello should suspend the sending of nurses abroad. We need our healthcare personnel here at this time of public health emergency to attend to sick Filipinos, and not to foreigners,” Rodriguez said in a statement.

According to Rodriguez, the Philippine healthcare system was swamped with cases of COVID-19 and several public and private hospitals had reported a lack of personnel.

Hundreds of healthcare workers were likewise sidelined as they were quarantined over possible exposure to the disease, the lawmaker added.

"We need those nurses bound for Germany and other jobs overseas to augment our dwindling public health workforce,” Rodriguez said, adding that the deployment of nurses to other countries could resume after COVID-19 had been eradicated in the Philippines.

Moreover, Rodriguez urged the DOH to refrain from asking for volunteer medical professionals to help respond to the COVID-19 crisis and instead hire and pay them with competitive rates.

Hazard pay and special risk allowances should also be given to recruited healthcare workers.

“They should be properly compensated. They are our modern-day heroes,” he said.

The DOH had addressed concerns over volunteer healthcare workers and apologized for giving them a measly P500 a day for their service. — DVM, GMA News