Little Flower hospital nurses’ strike enters 7th day

Sunday, January 08, 2012: The flash strike staged by around 70 nurses in the Little Flower Hospital at Angamaly as a protest against contract system of employment in the hospital, has entered the seventh day.
The strike, called by the United Nurses Association (UNA), was against the one-year contract system followed by the hospital management.
The management is paying the minimum wages. The demand of the nurses is that the hospital make them permanent staff, sources said.
According to sources, the strike was triggered by the refusal of the hospital management to extend the service of four nurses whose contract term was over. While the contract of some nurses was extended, a few others were asked to leave.
Meanwhile, the hospital management in a statement said that the strike was orchestrated under pressure of “external forces who are trying to destroy the goodwill of the hospital.”