Health

The Government Services Employees Association of Mauritius (GSEA) organised a Health Day on 9 August 2018 at the GSEA headquarters in collaboration with the Ministry of Health and Quality of Life. It was an awareness-raising programme, with a huge participation of members of the Association and the public.

“Care work, both paid and unpaid, is at the heart of humanity and our societies.” From cradle to grave, as children, adults and elders, directly or indirectly, care work ensures our self-development and the reproduction of social life. More than three quarters of care givers are women and girls. And most of these provide unpaid care work in their families. This contributes significantly to the reinforcing of gender inequality.

More than 2,000 employees from the Geneva university hospitals (HUG) in Switzerland have signed a petition asking for dramatic changes to their working conditions and pension fund allowances. Keen to provide quality public services, they denounce the declining work conditions that they face daily, and which prevent them from providing the services required.

On 26 November, PSI General Secretary Rosa Pavanelli, with the leadership of Kommunal, meet the Chairman of the Health Committee in the Parliament, Hon. Joseph Nyah Somwarbi, at the House of Parliament of Liberia, to lobby for the rights of public sector unions and workers such as the National Health Workers Union of Liberia (NAHWUL) to be recognized formally and legally and to be allowed to unionize in line with ILO Conventions.

The recent deaths of two young women health workers in Nigeria, Saifura and Hauwa, are the latest tragic examples of the dangers faced by workers when delivering public services. However, on this 25 November, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, we must remember that it is not only in the extreme conditions of conflict zones that workplace violence occurs.

PSI participated in the 6th Violence in the Health Sector conference that was held in Toronto on 24-26 October on the theme “Advancing the Delivery of Positive Practice”. The conference provided a platform for all parties confronted with the phenomenon of violence in healthcare to develop and implement positive practice and proactively respond to this complex problem.

Nurses from PSI affiliate NSF (Norwegian Nurses Organisation), on strike since 25 October, were forced to resume work after the Association of Norwegian Enterprise announced a lockout - the first ever in Norwegian healthcare - and the Norwegian government had to step into the conflict.

#SolidarityWithRefugees  PSI is launching the first video, of a series of three, on building quality public services for Syrian refugees in Lebanon. This first video focuses on quality public healthcare for all.