Shillong, June 1: The case of a frontline worker who was denied leave despite being pregnant, eventually leading her to contracting Covid and her subsequent death has raised serious concerns on the safety of health workers and,  more importantly,  state government’s policies towards their staff. Despite the government’s notifications to allow maternity leave, the respective departments/institutions not following the same has also raised questions.

Coming down heavily on the government for its omission, the ‘Ka Sur U Paidbah Ka Bri U Hynniewtrep’, a citizen’s forum, has demanded the government to direct all departments to strictly comply with the notification exempting pregnant women from attending office

As per a notification by the Government of Meghalaya on May 17, “Persons with disabilities and Pregnant Women employees should stay at home and are exempted from attending office”.

“…we strongly demand that the government issue a strict office orders to all departments to follow/adhere to sensitive notification/orders/guidelines issued from times to times in letter and spirit, so as to ensure that the health and live of its employees are protected at all time,” the forum’s spokesperson, Thomas Passah said in a memorandum to the chief secretary, MS Rao on Monday.

According to him, the next of kin of one of the frontline workers (nurse) deployed at Ganesh Das Hospital, Lawmali, has report an incident, wherein a pregnant staff nurse was not granted leave by the management and was compelled to continue her duty despite having reported about her ill health, which further lead to her death after being tested Covid-19 positive.

“This incident has clearly pointed out that even the Government departments are not adhering to guidelines issued by the Government which jeopardize the life of the citizens of the state. We are not aware if there are other similar violation(s) by other departments,” Passah added.

Identifying people with advance pulmonary disease

The forum has lauded the health department for coming up with a notification on May 11, which advises all administrative heads of the departments, heads of all directorates/CCMTs at the village level to identify all the employees/residents with previous record of advance pulmonary disease or are under medication for the same and advise such persons to work from home.

“This is seen as a very important decision taken for the welfare of our citizen. However, we kindly request the health departments to ensure that same is implemented in letter and spirit,” Passah stated in the letter.