‘How we Surviving?’: Guyana’s contract nurses speak out after months without pay

Aug 14, 2026 News

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(Kaieteur News) – These are the words of a registered nurse who has served in Guyana’s public healthcare system since 2018. Pushed to breaking point, she recently worked full 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. shifts, Monday through Friday, for three consecutive months — without receiving a single cent in salary. Last year, her situation was even worse: she went eight agonising months without pay.

Her ordeal is not an isolated incident. It is the harsh reality facing contract healthcare workers under the Ministry of Health (MOH), where bureaucratic delays, lost files, and archaic paper-based recordkeeping leave frontline staff drowning in debt, mental exhaustion, and hopelessness.

“Overdoing the Do”: A systemic paperwork collapse

The crisis stems from a shift in the public health sector away from permanent employment and toward contractual engagements requiring periodic renewal. With every renewal window, however, comes a predictable, systemic collapse in payroll processing.

Despite workers submitting documentation well in advance, healthcare staff are being systematically dropped from the payroll for months at a time while their paperwork sits in processing.

“In this day and age, an oil-rich country like Guyana, the Ministry of Health should not be using paperwork!” one nurse exclaimed. “Everything you go to them: they misplace something, they can’t find your folder, your contract, your form. They still got paper falling out of folders and then you, the employee, have to suffer!”

Another nurse shared a strikingly similar story of administrative neglect:

“I work at the hospital and got taken off the payroll when I renewed my contract way before it was supposed to be up. Now I have no money because the $20,000 I had finished in bills. I have school fees to pay, no money to go to work, or buy groceries. I don’t know how I will make it to work until I get paid again. This is very stressful when we are working tirelessly and there is no satisfaction from MOH.”

The human cost: Disrupted lives and stripped independence

Behind the administrative inertia are real human beings struggling to maintain basic survival while continuing to care for patients.

For one single mother renting a home for $75,000 a month, the missing income has shattered her domestic stability. Her home internet was disconnected, forcing her to rely on mobile hotspots so her child could do schoolwork, while basic necessities like diapers, wipes, and groceries have become daily hurdles. A side catering business she launched to cushion the blow collapsed after she was forced to drain her working capital just to cover rent and utilities.

Younger professionals are being stripped of their independence, forced back into financial dependency on aging parents just to afford transportation to their shifts.

“I don’t know how the heck I gonna make out. My mom said she’ll help me pay my next month’s fee… I’m a 27-year-old, I can’t depend on my mother to give me money to go to work,” a nurse shared. “Right now, I’m pissed off. I’m so stressed. I’m so fed up and sick… You know how it is working night shifts? We don’t even sleep. We’re up the whole night with these babies… It’s very, very stressful.”

Crumbling infrastructure and leadership failure

The financial strain on nurses is compounded by deteriorating working conditions inside public health centers and a glaring lack of support from supervisory management.

Neglected facilities: Staff routinely contend with broken infrastructure, from hauling buckets of water to flush toilets to purchasing basic medical supplies out of pocket.

“The washroom don’t work properly… imagine a big government workplace, to fetch bucket of water to flush toilet,” one nurse recounted. “The blood pressure machine don’t have batteries. This morning, me and the next colleague had to put we little $100s together and buy eight batteries because you know what? The work have to do!”

Unresponsive leadership: Frontline workers report feeling completely abandoned by middle management. While clinical mistakes trigger immediate disciplinary action for nurses, supervisory staff face zero consequences for withholding months of earned compensation.

“All these supervisors are there just sitting down and they don’t give a s**t. You can go cry to them, tell them this happening, and they don’t even care!”

Collapsing morale: The physical strain of unpaid night shifts, coupled with total institutional neglect, is crippling workforce capacity.

“Our employers show us no care and empathy,” one worker lamented. “If your employers don’t care about you, how you functioning in society?”

With no immediate resolution offered by the ministry, nurses say they are reaching their breaking point. Many are contemplating collective action, staying home, or abandoning the medical profession entirely for manual labour or security work — fields where, at the very least, paychecks arrive on schedule.

Frontline workers demand urgent reform

Affected workers are calling for an immediate audit and complete overhaul of the Ministry of Health’s HR and payroll operations. They are demanding three concrete interventions:

1. Digital modernisation — Transitioning immediately from manual paper folders to a centralised, digital HR and payroll system to eliminate lost contracts and automatic payroll drops.
2. Administrative accountability — Implementing strict performance oversight for HR personnel and unit supervisors to ensure employee pay grievances are resolved swiftly.
3. Immediate clearance of arrears — Processing all outstanding salaries and multi-term gratuity payments immediately, alongside fully stocking healthcare facilities with functional equipment and utilities.

As one nurse succinctly put it: “I don’t want nothing extra, but give me what I work for! Give the nurses what they working for. Simple.”

Ministry responds

When contacted for a response to the allegations, Minister of Health, Dr. Frank Anthony directed affected staff toward existing internal channels. “Any nurse with a problem should visit the office of the deputy permanent secretary, who is responsible for all HR matters,” he said. “I am sure we will be able to resolve it.”

As Guyana’s economy grows rapidly, its essential frontline healthcare workers are left pleading to be paid for their labour.

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• contract nurses, months without pay, Surviving, systemic paperwork collapse

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