State hospital workers forced to apply for welfare loans

SOME 140,000 temporary workers at government hospitals are at risk of a major crisis, as state hospitals don’t have money to pay their salaries, Government Employee Association deputy chairman Osot Suwansawet said yesterday.
He said Yala Hospital reportedly posted an announcement to get its temporary workers to sign a welfare loan application along with their salary slip over the past two days in order to get money this month for them and their families.
The news comes as Health Ministry officials are due to meet with temporary employees’ representatives today to discuss recruiting a quota of “temps” as permanent employees and the budget framework, deputy permanent secretary Dr Wachira Pengjuntr said. He insisted the ministry would proceed with its plan to make them permanent workers.
Osot said his association wants the ministry to solve the temporary workers’ status issue as many hospitals have difficulty paying their salaries.
He said Yala Hospital’s solution to get temps to sign welfare loan applications – which only allows up to 80 per cent of their salary – made them debtors and they already endured working without pay.
He said these workers had no choice – or they would get no salary for October.
The situation in Yala showed the ministry’s failure to take care of workers and would affect the care of patients, he said.
If the problem was prolonged, the group would escalate their movement to protect the rights of these 140,000 temporary workers.
In related news, Dr Wachira said the Health Ministry would issue a regulation to hike overtime for expert doctors serving cross-hospitals within a healthcare area. He said the “seamless healthcare service” policy, involving 12 health service areas, took effect on October 1 to allow hospitals in the same area to share resources such as surgery rooms and surgeons.
This had successfully reduced patients’ waiting time, sped up patient treatments and maximised human resources. He said only the Nakhon Sawan Hospital-led third area, Udon Thani Hospital-led eighth area and Songkhla Hospital-led twelfth area had no specialised medical centre yet. So the ministry would fund them to set up such centres and train doctors.