Malaga province needs 61 more nurses to ensure smooth running of flu vaccination campaign

In Malaga province, the union has requested a total of 61 additional nurses, as Satse provincial secretary Eugenio Pérez said.

"At the very least, we are requesting one additional nurse at each health centre to bolster the vaccination campaign, while continuing to provide the care and maintain the range of services nurses deliver in primary care," he said.

Of the total of 61 additional nurses, the Satse has asked that Malaga city get 26 for the 26 health centres, in addition to one for Rincón de la Victoria, six for the Guadalhorce Valley, nine for the Axarquía area, five for the Ronda area and 14 for the Costa del Sol health area.

The SAS has announced the launch of a mass vaccination campaign without specifying measures to bolster nursing staff numbers, despite these workers being the ones to bear the brunt of the workload in the immunisation programme.

The Satse union points out that nurses do not "merely administer the vaccines, but are responsible for planning the campaign, reaching out to the target population, receiving and storing the doses, managing the vaccination teams, monitoring vaccination coverage and keeping an eye out for any adverse reactions".

Their workload is therefore enormous. In Malaga alone, last season's vaccination campaign achieved very high coverage, with 351,122 people receiving the flu jab and 140,096 receiving the coronavirus vaccine.

In addition, the SAS has organised walk-in flu vaccination days: every Wednesday from 11 November to 16 December and two "super Saturdays" in shopping centres and the headquarters of religious brotherhoods. All of this requires the deployment of a significant number of nurses.

For all these reasons, Satse considers it essential that the SAS "ensures that all staff absences are covered, whether due to sick leave, time off, leave of absence, reduced working hours or holidays and that staffing levels are reinforced in those centres where the pressure on care services may increase as the campaign progresses".

Furthermore, the trade union has requested that, in cases where sufficient additional staff are not provided, the SAS take organisational measures to prevent services from becoming overburdened. Among these, it proposes extending vaccination hours through the voluntary participation of healthcare workers, with remuneration provided for this work.

The union stresses that the campaign cannot happen "at the expense of increasing the workload of staff who are already dealing with a significant caseload due to a shortage of healthcare professionals and difficulties in meeting the structural needs of Andalusian healthcare centres".

In addition, "giving priority to the comprehensive vaccination process while the campaign is under way significantly reduces nurses' ability to devote time to other equally essential activities".

The trade union warns that the concentration of resources on vaccination hinders the implementation of prevention and health promotion measures, as well as the monitoring of patients with chronic and multiple conditions, both in healthcare centres and in their own homes.

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