Scores of healthcare workers at Liberia’s main hospital have gone on strike over unpaid wages, complicating the fight against the world’s worst Ebola epidemic that the U.S. disease prevention chief said was spiralling out of control.
As well as the quickly mounting human toll, the United Nations warned the spread of the fever could lead to food shortages in West Africa, potentially further depleting the resources of governments frantically trying to contain it.
The World Health Organisation and other international bodies are scrambling to support of fragile healthcare systems in some of the world’s poorest countries, but so far additional staff and resources have been slow to arrive on the ground.
More than 120 healthworkers have died during the Ebola outbreak amid shortages of equipment and trained staff in the region. That is nearly a 10th of the total 1,550 killed by the disease, mostly in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
The strike at the John F. Kennedy Medical Center (JFK) in Liberia’s capital Monrovia follows a one-day protest over pay and conditions at the Connaught hospital in Sierra Leone’s capital on Monday. Both hospitals have treated Ebola patients.
“Health workers have died (fighting Ebola), including medical doctors at … JFK and to have them come to work without food on their table, we think that is pathetic,” George Williams, secretary general of the Health Workers Association of Liberia, told Reuters.
Williams said healthcare workers at JFK, the country’s largest referral hospital, had gone unpaid for two months.
reuters
Leave a Reply