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"Massive absenteeism" and "stops of convenience": 5 minutes to understand the situation at the CHU de Guadeloupe

2021-11-04T16:01:27.939Z


The management of the CHU of Guadeloupe denounced Wednesday a "massive absenteeism rate" among its staff and suspects "stops of comp


“Abnormally high” sick leave, caregivers who are missing… The Pointe-à-Pitre University Hospital Center, the only CHU in Guadeloupe, sounded the alarm: in a press release published on Wednesday, the president of the establishment , Gérard Cotellon, denounces a "massive absenteeism rate" among his staff.

Suspecting work stoppages "of convenience", he threatens to seize the Council of the Order of Physicians.

We take stock.

What is the context?

Degradation, threats, sabotage ... Actions have multiplied in recent weeks in hospitals on the island, against the backdrop of contestation of the obligation to vaccinate caregivers and the health pass. Despite this opposition movement, vaccination has greatly progressed in health establishments in the archipelago. At the CHU, the vaccination rate of nursing staff has "gone from 30% in September to nearly 80% today", greets the director of the Regional Health Agency of Guadeloupe, Valérie Denux. Of the approximately 3,500 hospital staff at the establishment, 717 were suspended this Thursday for non-compliance with the vaccination obligation, specifies the deputy director of the hospital, Cédric Zolezzi. But regularizations take place "every day" and this figure is decreasing.

However, a few pockets of resistance continue to shake health establishments.

They are representative of the mistrust of the population vis-à-vis the national health policy and vaccination.

ARS Guadeloupe records a rate of 46% of first-time adults injected, against 76.1% throughout France.

"The many false information told on social networks feed a feeling of fear and mistrust, especially since there is a history of tension", explains Valérie Denux, who refers to the chlordecone scandal.

This pesticide, classified as an endocrine disruptor, had been used extensively in banana plantations in the Antilles, contaminating more than 90% of the population in Guadeloupe and Martinique.

Why does the CHU evoke "stops of convenience"?

Work stoppages have been increasing in recent days, note the local hospital authorities. In some nursing services, the absenteeism rate “is around 30%”. "The number of sick leaves observed since October 25 is abnormally high during this period, compared to identical periods in past years," said CHU director Gérard Cotellon in his press release. "It is three to four times higher than the average", details Cédric Zolezzi.

According to management, such a rate of absenteeism can only be explained "by stops of convenience". "It's very surprising that everyone falls ill the week the caregivers are suspended," cédric Zolezzi quipped. "There are people who are sincerely exhausted, we faced a very difficult crisis situation during the summer holidays (

hospitals were saturated in the face of an outbreak of Covid-19 contaminations

)", recalls Valérie Denux. "But there are others, for some vaccinated, who stop under pressure from colleagues," she says, referring to "threats".

“What we denounce, insists Cédric Zolezzi, it is not the judgments, but the abuses of prescribers.

One can imagine gestures of protest, or of solidarity, even if these people are in order for what concerns them personally.

"

What consequences for patients?

Faced with this absenteeism rate, "the CHU is forced to pool several surgical and medical services as part of a business continuity plan", indicates Gérard Cotellon in his press release.

But, the management assures him: “The hospital is not destabilized.

No patient will be left without care.

"" We are not in a crisis situation, insists Cédric Zolezzi.

We continue to carry out our missions, but in less comfortable conditions than usual.

"

For its part, the Union of Health Workers (UTS) -UGTG of the CHU of Guadeloupe - whose members are on strike against the vaccination obligation - affirms that the situation is "quite serious".

"In surgery, hospital workers suffer from a lack of personnel, we have been forced to close beds, the supply of care is degraded", lists with the Parisian Sandro Sormain, deputy secretary of the union.

What are the unions responding to?

For the UTS-UGTG, the increase in these stops can be explained by "the exhaustion of caregivers, who work in deplorable conditions, not to mention people who are simply sick".

In addition, "because of the suspensions, the workforce is reduced and the staff gets more tired, there is psychological stress", notes Sandro Sormain.

"They have the change of their coin" because "80% of people who have been vaccinated have been under duress", comments for his part Gaby Clavier, union representative of the same organization, quoted by AFP.

The UTS-UGTG denounces the attitude of the management, which "gives lessons to the doctors" prescribers "without cleaning in front of its door".

“Yesterday, caregivers were heroes, today we are treated with contempt,” says Sandro Sormain.

What can the CHU do?

Faced with what he suspects are work stoppages of convenience, Gérard Cotellon brandished the threat to alert the Council of the Order of Physicians as well as the General Social Security Fund of Guadeloupe.

The drafting of medical certificates is supervised: the professional must comply with the provisions of the Public Health Code and the Code of Ethics.

"A doctor who would write a certificate of convenience would therefore be exposed to disciplinary sanctions," said the Parisian Council of the Order of Physicians.

The General Social Security Fund, it has means of control, which can lead "to questioning the practice and issue warnings", explains Cédric Zolezzi.

But, he adds, “we don't want to come to that”.

“We want to ask these prescribing doctors to pull themselves together, to show judgment in this complicated period for everyone.

"

Source: leparis

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