At least 113 healthcare workers with Long Covid were fired

At least 113 healthcare workers with Long Covid have been fired. Another 98 employees received notice of dismissal, which means they'll be fired within the foreseeable future, trade union FNV Zorg & Welzijn reports.

The union researched the working situation of 1,000 healthcare workers who got Covid-19 during the first coronavirus wave and still have complaints two years later. Of them, 518 completed the poll. According to FNV Vice-President Kitty JOng, over 40 percent of this group have been or will soon be fired. That feels like a "kick for all those healthcare professionals who were on the front line to keep the Netherlands going," she said.

At the end of February, the Cabinet announced that employers in the healthcare sector could use a subsidy scheme to keep employees with Long Covid in service for at least six months. It concerns people who became ill between March 2020 and December 2020.

According to FNV, this arrangement comes too late. Only ten healthcare workers in the survey said that their employer would use the subsidy. 59 percent said that their employer would not use the scheme because they felt it unlikely that the employee would recover within six months. 29 percent of the surveyed healthcare workers did not even know the scheme existed.

FNV wants Minister Conny Helder for Long Term Care to make a Covid-19 fund available to financially compensate dismissed care providers. "The majority of them were infected in the workplace," said Jong. "The nursing homes were locked, personal protective equipment was virtually unavailable." The union wants the Covid-19 fund to be comparable with current funds for occupational diseases, like funds for people who work with asbestos or who have contracted painting disease.