Volunteer health workers who were recently decommissioned from the Lagos State Isolation Centre in Mainland Hospital, Yaba, have accused of being insensitive to their plights.
The aggrieved caregivers decried being owed three-month allowances for January to March being the agreed payment for their selfless service in managing COVID-19 patients at the Infectious Diseases Hospital.
Some of the workers who spoke with the Clinical Health Journal told our correspondent that though few volunteers recruited from the private sector have been paid two of their three-month arrears, the rest of them who were recruited from the public hospitals have been ignored since March.
To further worsen the matter, the affected volunteers lamented that they have been decommissioned and asked to return to their various health facilities last month.
They made a passionate appeal to the Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu to help intervene in the matter.
“Up till now, we have not been paid a dime. All we keep hearing is that the Ministry of Health will pay us. We are beginning to lose hope.
“We are begging Governor Sanwo-Olu to help us. We still don’t understand why they paid private health workers without looking towards our direction for months now?” she quipped.
However, the State Commissioner of Information and Strategy, Gbenga Omotoso, has reassured that the health workers would get paid.
He reiterated that Lagos has no record of owing people without paying.
The commission noted that the only bottleneck they had was documentation and logistics, adding that the state government has approved their payment.
