September 14, 2022
Nurses see risk in Covid green light
The kaiwhakahaere of the Nurses Organisation warns people will get sick and die with the dropping of the Covid traffic light system because there aren’t enough nurses.
Kerri Nuku says the workforce shortage includes hospitals, aged care centres, primary care, and hauora Maori.
She wants to know whether the change is driven by science or by political and financial imperatives, and whether long Covid has been factored in.
“These are debilitating. They require a primary healthcare response and I don’t think we’ve looked at how we’re going to deal with that plan, how we are going to have a workforce that responds and who we are pleasing here with these changes to the mandating rules,”
Ms Nuku says.