On Contracts: Pims nurses go on token strike

Contractual nurses of Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) go on a token strike.

ISLAMABAD: Contractual nurses of Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) went on a token strike from 12pm to 1pm on Wednesday. They are demanding that their services be regularised.

A total of 209 nurses in Pims work are working as contractual employees. Many of them have been working at the hospital for the past five to six years, said Sharif Khatak, a male nurse.

“Though their contracts kept on extending in the past, the recent incident with the Polyclinic nurses have made us insecure. We want to be regularised,” he added.

According to them, if nurses in other provinces have been regularised, the same can be done in Islamabad.

“We are the backbone of the health industry. But our services have always been taken for granted,” a nurse told The Express Tribune.

“Giving our rights on right time could be the acknowledgement of our services, but it is too unfortunate that we have to come on streets to ask for them,” she added.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 24^th, 2011