MUMN urges government to call in police over nurses' uniforms issue

The Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses said today it was not intimidated by a statement from the Health Department that it might call in the police over a statement issued by the union yesterday over a shortage of nurses' uniforms.

In a statement, the department said there could not be interference of any kind during the government procurement process.

The union said it was actually encouraging the department to call in the police.

It explained that nurses and midwives are entitled to receive a set of uniforms every year, but the last consignment was made in 2008. No new nurses uniforms were handed out in 2009 and last year, and new nurses were still wearing their student uniforms.

Nurses were required to put on a new uniform every day and sometimes even more frequently because of their contact with patients, and the issue of uniforms was therefore important for the safety of the nurses and the patients themselves, the union stressed.

No patient appreciated the fact that a nurse might approach him with blood on her uniform from another patient.

The union insisted that the Health Department should immediately solve this problem and supply the nurses with their uniforms, including shoes, as they were entitled in their collective agreement. It again warned it may take industrial action unless the matter was resolved.