Gov't begins process to engage trained nurses

Government has started the process to secure financial clearance to engage publicly trained nurses who ended their training in 2016, a deputy minister has disclosed. “The Ministry has taken their list to the Finance Ministry so that they will be cleared; we have a plan for them to be employed,” a Deputy Health Minister, Tina Mensah said. Deputy Health Minister Tina Mensah explained that government cannot engage both private and public nurses at the same time due to inadequate funds. Some of the 9,905 government-trained nurses across the country stormed the Ministry of Health on Monday seeking evidence of having been posted to various health centres across the country. They claimed to have been without jobs for 15 months. But for the intervention of the police, the aggrieved nurses would have spent Monday night in the open at the Health Ministry. Ms Mensah described the situation as unfortunate having engaged them and assured them of employment. She also suggested that the protesting nurses from both public and private training institutions could look for jobs elsewhere since they are not bonded by the Health Ministry. But the Minister of Information, Mustapha Hamid, has urged the protesting nurses to go home as there are adequate provisions to recruit them. “We are still bent on taking care of those from the private institutions together with those from the public institutions. We are calling on them to quit picketing, because they are going to be taken care of.” He assured government has made provisions for the recruitment of 32,000 health personnel including 27,000 for various categories of nurses in the 2018 budget. By Kwabena Adu Gyamfi|3news.com|Ghana Follow @3Newsgh  ]]>