Nurses from across the greater Toronto area gathered in Yonge and Dundas Square on Thursday wearing gowns, masks, gloves and face shields to demand that the government take their workplace concerns seriously, especially legislation limiting their pay.
In 2019, the Ford administration passed House Bill 124, which limits wage increases for many healthcare workers to a maximum of one percent of total compensation for three years.
Just a few months later, COVID-19 took hold of Ontario and Canada, pushing the plight of healthcare workers into the spotlight.
Since then, frustration and anger over Bill 124 have been intensified by burnout due to the circumstances nurses face due to the pandemic and colleagues leaving work.
Along a stretch of sidewalk in front of the Eaton Center, nurses gathered Thursday as rain fell intermittently and cars honked and ambulances sounded supportive sirens.
They shouted their messages through megaphones: “Kill Bill 124!” and “Doug Ford is playing Russian roulette with Bill 124.”
The Star spoke to some of the protesters:
Lyndsay Raab, 39 years old: Raab says she has witnessed “systemic failure” since she became a nurse in 2008 in the far west of the city and at St. Joseph Hospital. She says that when it started, there were nights where it was possible to take a long break and just enjoy work because “it was manageable.” Now the circumstances have become “significantly worse”.
Raab says that even with the expansion of the emergency department, there is great diversity in the needs of the patients they serve.
“We have people who are so complex in their medical needs that they end up staying in the emergency department for a long time.” Raab explains. “It is a workload for emergency nurses, which is where I work the most, because we cannot provide adequate care.
“These people deserve to have a bed and we deserve to have a safe workload.”
Kelly Baumann, 30 years old: Baumann appeared at the protest with a sign that read “Heroes deserve more than a pat on the back.”
She says she decided to demonstrate downtown because she feels “undervalued.”
In her nine years of nursing, Baumann never saw a pay increase. “We had that COVID-19 payment, and that was fine for two months,” she said, unimpressed.
Baumann believes that Bill 124 reflects some of the sexism that continues to show its ugly head in the workforce. “As a woman in a female-dominated race, we are getting the shorter end of the stick. Police, firefighters and (other front-line workers) have gotten more raises, ”Baumann said, referring to discrepancies in bill 124.
In addition to being poorly paid, nurses are understaffed, he said. “We are caring for more unpredictable patients and it is much more emotionally stressful.
He said he hopes people can see, in the form of the demonstration, the ripple effect of treating nurses badly.
“Healthcare is about nurses. Nurses are the backbone of healthcare. And without them, without being treated properly … the nurses leave, and that is why we are so rare in hospitals ”.
Jackie Sarra, 39 years old: “It would be really nice to hear a ‘Thank you!’ Sarra says. “There are many insults, derogatory terms. They even spat on us. People beat us every day. “
In her 16 years as a nurse, there have always been constant gaps, and COVID-19 exacerbated them.
But the “last straw,” he said, is Ford’s Bill 124.
“I started to doubt myself, even as a nurse. We are simply not enough to take care of people.
“Patients arrive and receive inadequate service, because we are tired.
“We are tired of working with few personnel. We are tired of not being able to give our one hundred percent and what patients deserve as citizens and taxpayers ”.
Due to shortages and inadequate services, he has been waking up and beginning his days with immense anxiety.
“I wake up every day thinking about how many patients I can’t give my 100 percent,” Sarra said. “I think about how many people will I have to look in the eyes, needy patients staring at me because the emergency rooms are jammed and waiting for me to take care of them.”
“It’s not that I do not want to…. Not that any of us want to…. We all want to help others; that is why we are entering this profession: saving and helping lives.
“But we are simply not enough to do it.”
Jeanne Ernst, 54 years old: “It is a known fact that when the workload of nurses increases on a patient, the mortality rate in patients increases.
“That has to end.”
Ernst has been a nurse for over 30 years. She says that, in its early days, there was also a shortage of nurses.
She calls it a “chronic shortage of nurses.
“If you lose three nurses of 30 years (experience), it is almost 100 years of experience. When you bring in three nurses, that’s less than a year of experience to replace him. “
To add icing to a sour cake, Bill 124 and the pandemic combined create a “system that is bleeding into healthcare and healthcare workers,” Ernst said.
“The public does not know much about the nursing crisis, so we are here too: to educate the public about what is happening.”
Aaron Thabarajah, Hospital Doorman: “I’ve been in my hospital for a year and almost 40 or 50 nurses have left,” she said. “I have seen constant shifts of nurses with little staff. I’ve seen patient care decrease, because some of the nurses who are already working work seven days straight, and those are 12 hour shifts. Ultimately, that affects patient care, and then a lot of the new nurses we get are barely surviving. “
Leah Waxman, ER RN: “I have been here for eight years and I have not seen a mass exodus since I started. I know many nurses cry before their shift and are now petrified. They are terrified for themselves, for their staff, for their patients. The nurse to patient ratio is not safe, no matter where you are. We see more than 300 patients who go through the emergency department on some days; they cannot be given the attention they need. It’s not fair to nurses. It is not fair to doctors. It’s not fair to anyone, ”Waxman said.
“People are having critical results, and if it has reached this point where doctors are talking and nurses are talking, then you should listen because we are concerned about you.”
“The nurses, who have left medical care, say that it is too stressful and that they do not feel safe. They are afraid of having their license taken away for making critical mistakes. They do not feel supported. And the only reason they say they don’t want to leave is because of their colleagues. “
Helen Winter, ER RN: “The pandemic was so tough. They called us heroes. We are not heroes; we are people who just want to do our job. But the length and magnitude of what we saw is nothing expected. I made an extra $ 0.47 per hour as a raise, that’s nothing. We received a pandemic payment for four months. Matched for 24 months, it’s $ 150 a month.
“That is unacceptable.”
“Aside from the fact that we’ve had to deal with the hardest things anyone can do, we do things that you can’t really pay another human being to do, but we do.
“We are trained health professionals and we demand to be recognized as such.
“I’m hearing stories even today, of people who went away saying, ‘I was having palpitations when I came to work.’
“That is not acceptable.
“Some of us talk openly about the amount of stress. We cry when we get up in the morning and yet we do it. Many nurses have left just because, financially, it is not worth it. The cost of family life, the cost of personal health.
“We want more.”
—With files from Jenna Moon
Reference-www.thestar.com