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Paramedics demand fuel for second day

30 Jun 2022

  • Strike continues today; threaten to refrain from field visits tomorrow onwards 
BY Dinitha Rathnayake    The 48-hour trade union action launched by paramedical trade unions is to continue today (30) demanding fuel for paramedical services. Speaking to The Morning, Public Health Inspectors’ (PHI) Union Secretary S.I. Bopitiya said that a total of eight health categories of paramedical staffers, including PHIs, entomologists, school dental service providers, electroencephalogram (EEG) and electrocardiogram (ECG) recorders, dental technicians, dispensers, and public health laboratory technicians in the State health service are participating in the 48-hour strike against the fuel shortage. “Healthcare workers have to report to work daily yet no arrangements are being made to ensure that they are provided with fuel to help them perform even field services. Fuel sheds have been allocated to provide fuel for vehicles of essential services, including those of the health service, but they did not have petrol and diesel on 24 June. Also, there are no separate queues for us. Further, there is the possibility of the said provision being misused,” he said. If the Government fails to give a proper solution, we will not attend any field visits from tomorrow (1 July), he warned.   “We had to stay for hours, the same as the public, to get fuel, and therefore we couldn’t go for our field visits due to this reason. Even though preference was to be given to essential services, the fact is that even those who were given the choice of working from home too made use of this benefit.” Staffers in paramedical categories are paid Rs. 1,200 as a fuel allowance which is severely inadequate at present owing to rising costs. With that amount, they can only purchase two litres of petrol for their motorbikes under the current prices. With a basic salary of Rs. 32,000, no member of the paramedical service could cope with the increasing cost of living and the added burden of having to fill his/her fuel tank to carry out field work in terms of their service. “One PHI has to take care of more than six Grama Niladhari Divisions and they are not getting enough fuel for field visits. The anti-dengue mosquito fogging machine also needs fuel. In Sri Lanka, dengue cases have more than doubled this year compared to the same period last year due to the lack of pesticides and diesel to implement the prevention programmes at the ground level,” he said. According to the National Dengue Control Unit, there has been a rapid increase in the number of dengue patients. The PHIs Union said that the dengue prevention programmes cannot be implemented due to the lack of pesticides and diesel for both dengue prevention activities, and their personal transport. “We are even unable to do routine checkups either, mainly due to the fuel issue. On the other hand, we are completely out of stock for pesticides in all MOH offices. Therefore, we are unable to support the dengue prevention programmes that are being implemented by the authorities”.


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