Nurses stage token protest in major hospitals in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 26 October 2010, 06:44 GMT]
Medical nurses in ten major government hospitals in Sri Lanka abstained from duties for three hours Monday from 8:00 a.m to 9:00 a.m demanding Sri Lanka government to meet the four demands placed by their trade union. The nurses in Jaffna Teaching Hospital too took part in the token protest demonstration, sources in Jaffna said. Meanwhile, the protesting nurses had sat in front of the National Hospital in Colombo Monday for an hour as a sign of their protest demonstration. The nurses will extend the boycott from duties in all the hospitals of the country if SL government fails to meet their demands, the sources added.

The nurses in Jaffna Teaching Hospital who reported for duties Monday morning left the hospital at 8:00 a.m and stood out on the road in front of the hospital abstaining from duty until 9:00 a.m.

The four demands placed by the nurses include a salary increase and the demand to extend the training period of nurses for four years as it had been earlier. The government had made it three years recently.

The demand to place all nurses who had completed twelve years service, in grade one is one of the four demands.