Around 250 village health nurses (VHNs), sector health nurses (SHNs), and community health nurses (CHNs) held a protest in the Madurai district collectorate campus against the increased work load due to Covid-19 vaccination duty. 

K Chinnaponnu, Madurai district secretary, Tamil Nadu Village Health Nurses Association, said they were suffering physically and mentally due to work overload. They were going for door-to-door duty every day to contribute to the mega Covid-19 vaccination drive taken up by the government. Running the vaccination drives on Sundays and working beyond 5 PM was unfair. While they maintained that they were ready to work hard to provide maximum Covid-19 vaccination to eligible people, however, unreasonable targets and pressure by the government hinders their overall work quality.

A VHN nurse further said that other department officials were not supporting them, and the general public unwilling to be vaccinated were verbally abusing them. The government has said that vaccination was a choice, but the nurses were pressured and threatened to achieve vaccination targets. Another nurse said that they were ready to vaccinate people, but they also need their personal space and time. The public should also have some accountability for not taking the Covid-19 vaccines. Other demands included promotion in five years and a 50% quota for CHNs to be promoted to district maternal and child health offices.

Source: ET Healthworld