On-call nurses in seven villages in Hudson’s Bay expressed their refusal to work this evening in order to protest in particular against the serious shortage of personnel in this remote region of Quebec where recruitment has always been an issue.
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“People are ready to resign en masse. We’ve been sounding the alarm for years. We are facing an exodus of nurses, already that people do not stay long in the North”, explains Maxime Godin, representative of the Northern Union of Hudson’s Bay Nurses and Care Professionals.
In the evening, the fifteen nurses who serve seven villages therefore refused to take the phone on duty to protest against their working conditions and staff turnover. It was doctors, managers or agency nurses who had to replace them.
Due to a lack of manpower in the region, some nurses sometimes find themselves doing 24-hour shifts without sleeping, deplores Mr. Godin. “It is difficult for them and dangerous for the population. And no one seems concerned about the situation, ”he adds.
“Yesterday, a colleague was crying and was in psychological distress [à cause des conditions]. It’s unacceptable” insists Maxime Godin.
In some villages, there are half as many nurses as normal due to lack of staff, according to the representative.