Measures in place to assist frontline workers - DCMO

Measures in place to assist frontline workers – DCMO

Apr 22, 2020 News

By Shivanie Rampersaud

In wake of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), frontline workers within the local health care system have been put to the test.

Deputy Chief Medical Officer (DCMO) Dr. Karen Boyle

Being required to work under such pressure has caused several of these healthcare providers to suffer mental and physical exhaustion. This has been compounded by the discrimination many of them have been facing by virtue of them caring for some person inflicted with the contagious disease. There have been reports that some healthcare workers are faced with difficulties when accessing public transportation.
To this end, Deputy Chief Medical Officer (DCMO), Dr. Karen Boyle, told Kaieteur News that measures are being put in place to transport these essential workers to and from their places of work.
She said “Ministry buses are providing transportation for healthcare workers and I know we are planning on having the bigger buses be made available on the major routes to pick up health care providers… So we are putting things in place for the healthcare workers at the hospitals.”
She added that “I want to urge the public not to treat our healthcare workers bad…or discriminate against our healthcare workers because it’s the same people they have to depend on to be at work, to take care of them and their families if and when they fall sick. So if they leave them on the roadside because they don’t want to have them in their buses… I don’t know how they are expecting them to get to work, so I would urge them to stop being discriminatory towards healthcare workers.”
As she emphasized that the entire country is dependent on these frontline workers during the prevailing public health crisis, the DCMO said, “We have to put two and two together and recognize that these are the people we are depending on. One to keep them safe and two to actually care for them…if they don’t reach to work, they can’t care for you,” she asserted.
The DCMO added that “in the interim, while the public is still acting the way they are, the Ministry is stepping up and putting measures in place to make sure that workers who need to get to the hospital and office do so safely and on time.”
When asked if these measures will be implemented in all Regions, Dr. Boyle said, “This will be in the regions where necessary; not all the regions are behaving like Region Four, most of the other regions are being supported. Not all but most.”
On the topic of psychological support, the DCMO noted that the Mental Health Unit is open to providing support and counseling to everyone, including the medical staff, who should be aware of this. “So it’s left to the healthcare workers to reach out if they need the support. It is a service that they know is available (so) it’s entirely up to them to reach if they feel they need it. So it is a service that is readily available so I would be happy if they would make use of it if they need it,” she added.

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