Covid Frontline Warriors: We risked our lives, now no one listens to us

Government COVID care facility workers are being increasingly terminated from services and struggling to find new jobs now

Representational photo

During May last year, when the country was reeling under the blues of the second COVID wave, Jyoti Dahiya, 24, used to go to a government COVID Care facility and start her night duty daily at 7:30 p.m. She used to take over the charge from the afternoon team, don the PPE kit, and begin attending patients, which went on till eight in the morning.

“Night shifts are 12-13 hours long. We drank very little water as initially, we couldn’t go to washrooms wearing the PPE kits. I used to sweat a lot and it was very difficult to even breathe as we used to wear three masks,” Ms. Dahiya said. Later, we used to get a break after six hours of shift and that is when we were allowed to take off the PPE kits, she added.

Ms. Dahiya is one of the 93 nursing officers who worked with the Delhi government during the second wave of the pandemic, and have been protesting for the past 15 days over the termination of their jobs. They were working at a Covid Care Centre in Ram Leela Ground and are now carrying out their protest outside LNJP Hospital.

“We took a lot of risk to work, but now we have been shown the door. Many Delhi government hospitals have vacancies, please post us anywhere else,” Ms. Dahiya said.

She added that they have written to the Deputy Chief Minister, Health Minister, Chief Minister and the L-G, but no one is listening to their plight.

Demand for alternative jobs

Meanwhile, another group of nursing staff and data entry operators who worked in South East district, whose services have also been terminated, are on a strike outside the Secretariat for a week now. They too are seeking alternative jobs in the government.

The government has ended their services as COVID-19 cases in the Capital have come down drastically over the last month.

Hemant Kumar, 25, a resident of Bharatpur in Rajasthan and who also worked at the Covid centre in Ram Leela Ground, said he was having trouble finding a new job.

“I am the eldest of the four in the family and my younger ones are still studying. My brother joined college last year and is in a hostel and I have been paying his fees. I don’t know what to do now,” Mr. Kumar, whose father is a farmer, said.

Ms. Dahiya said that a team of two-three nursing officers took care of medicines, food, and everything else related to patients.

“I was not scared while doing COVID duty as my father was in BSF and he always asked me to put the nation first,” she added.