Via CBC News: Ontario health-care workers warn of 'brutal' nurse shortage as hospitals brace for 4th wave. Excerpt:
Critical care nurses in southern Ontario have reached a breaking point after they say more than a year and a half of brutal pandemic work and stagnant pay has led to a staffing shortage so severe they believe it's putting patients in danger.
And as the fourth wave begins, with the number of COVID-19 cases in Ontario hitting 639 on Monday, they say they don't know how they or their hospitals will cope.
CBC News agreed to give four nurses anonymity so they could talk freely about the conditions at their hospitals. All of them said they'd face severe retribution from management for speaking out without permission.
"I have no doubt I'd be fired," said a Toronto nurse who's worked in the emergency department for more than 20 years.
But she said she can't stay silent any longer.
"The anxiety that I feel before having to go back to work because I don't know what I'm going to see or how many people I'm going to have to take care of because we're short staffed ... I am sometimes terrified," she said.
She is behind the Instagram account @nursewithsign416, which shares images of nurses, their families and other health professionals holding signs describing the importance of experienced nurses and how burned out they are, along with the hashtag #RNsilentnomore.
Many of the posts are demanding Premier Doug Ford's government repeal Bill 124, 2019 legislation that capped annual salary increases for many public sector employees, including nurses, at an average of one per cent annually for three years.
The Ministry of Health said it has recently announced $61 million in funding to train, recruit and hire thousands of registered and practical nurses. The province also provided nurses with a four-month pandemic pay salary top-up in 2020 and is working to provide mental health support for front-line health-care workers.
"Our government is incredibly grateful for the contributions of Ontario's health care workers and the critical role they have played throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, providing patients with timely, safe and equitable access to high quality care," said ministry spokesperson David Jensen.
Jensen said it's "inaccurate" to suggest Bill 124, which applies to nurses, teachers and many other public sector employees, caps wage increases at one per cent a year as they can still get raises for seniority and performance.
The Toronto nurse said that while she's at the top of the pay scale, her one per cent raise has translated to 47 cents an hour, even though she's doing the most dangerous and stressful work of her career.
