Incentive offered amid a shortage of nurses in the state
Nurses at a Sydney hospital are being lured with a $250 cash incentive to cancel their annual leaves and return to work. St. Vincent's Hospital said the bonus will be given per shift if the staff agree to forego their annual leave and report to work amid "critical staffing shortages." The lack of manpower is prompted by COVID-19, according to a report from Sky News, as New South Wales reported 23,131 new cases on January 3, raising the number of active infections to 157,873.
Amid the high figures, St. Vincent's Hospital has also asked its frontline workers to check if there are patients who can be discharged early as patient admissions with COVID-19 surpass 1,000 individuals. Despite this, intensive care unit (ICU) patients remain low, according to a report from the Sky News, with just 0.001% of active cases in the ICU.
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Shortage of nurses has been an ongoing problem since last year in New South Wales (NSW), where Sydney is the capital. The Guardian, as early as September, reported that NSW has been turning to other states and even overseas to recruit nurses to help accommodate arriving COVID-19 patients. By December, The Guardian said in a separate report that critically understaffed public hospitals in the state are now planning to fly nurses from overseas.
St George hospital, in an internal email obtained by the news outlet, said that the management has "commenced the process for overseas recruitment."
Brett Holmes, NSW Nurses and Midwives Association general secretary, called overseas recruitment as a "glimmer of hope" for hospitals that have been "turning themselves inside out trying to find staff."
The Guardian also reported that in a bid to bridge the shortage, some essential health workers even if considered close contacts can be recalled to their jobs.
