“
Less than a dozen
” Haute-Savoie firefighters have been suspended since Monday, August 16 due to the gradual application of the vaccination obligation, the department's firefighter director told AFP.
Read alsoCovid-19: notice of strike by firefighters against the vaccine obligation
Until September 15, firefighters, like all health professionals concerned, must present a negative covid test, if they are not yet vaccinated, to be able to work. A handful of them did not present this test on Monday for taking up their post, which led to their suspension, the regional daily
Le Dauphiné Libéré
said Thursday morning
, citing three of them.
“
I went to custody and got thrown like a dime after 21 years of service.
My self-test was not enough,
”one of them told the newspaper.
“We
had to make examples and we were the first to pay the price.
"Pascal Lorteau, director of SDIS Haute-Savoie, confirmed to AFP that"
less than a dozen
"firefighters, volunteers or professionals, have been suspended since Monday"
because they did not have negative result product
”of test.
He specifies that the firefighters cited by
the Dauphiné Libéré
have since seen their suspension lifted because they have "
brought themselves into compliance
".
A salary suspension for professionals
Some were still concerned, Thursday afternoon, by this sanction.
"
It must be reported to a total of more than 3,500 firefighters
" in the department, insists Pascal Lorteau, assuring that there has been "a
lot of internal communication (...), of pedagogy
".
"
We must face the facts: vis-à-vis some of the agents, even the best arguments of common sense do not bear
," regrets the director.
Read alsoGatherings of caregivers in Paris and Marseille against the vaccine obligation
Depending on the gradual application of this obligation - which concerns caregivers and employees of Ephad in particular -, at least one negative test must be presented until September 15, then at least one dose of vaccine against Covid-19 until October 15 so as not to be suspended.
For professional firefighters, this results in a suspension of salary.
At the beginning of August, one of the main French professional firefighters' unions, the FA SPP-PATS, announced that it had given notice of an indefinite national strike to protest against the compulsory vaccination of firefighters.
