DOH to release delayed stipend for rural nurses this week

After a four-month delay, the Department of Health (DOH) will start releasing this week the monthly stipend of some 10,000 registered nurses deployed in rural areas under the RN Heals program, its spokesman said Wednesday. In an exclusive interview, DOH Assistant Undersecretary Enrique T. Tayag said the DOH “fully understands" the grievances aired by RN Heals nurses in social networking sites, especially in relation to unpaid stipends.

“They will receive either within this week or by early next week their stipend," Tayag told GMA News Online. “Similarly, I am assuring them that their stipend within the next six months shall be released on time." Registered nurses serving in the program are given an allowance of P8,000 from the DOH and an additional P2,000 from local government units in their areas of assignment. “I am wholeheartedly begging for their understanding and apologizing to them because of their unpaid stipend. It is completely understandable that they feel aggrieved given the situation," Tayag said. The RN Heals (Registered Nurses for Health Enhancement and Local Services) program was launched last February in Catarman, Samar as a joint project of the DOH, the Department of Social Welfare and Development, and the Department of Labor and Employment. Most of the nurses were deployed for a period of one year in 1,221 depressed and remote communities all over the country that have little access to health services. “I am humbly requesting them to continue their service under the RN Heals project of the government. I assure them that we are working overtime to ensure the timely payment of their stipend," Tayag said. In a separate interview, Budget Secretary Butch Abad told GMA News Online that the Department of Budget and Management has already released the amount of P850 million allotted for the RN Heals project this year from the President’s Social Fund. Tayag, who is also the chief of the DOH National Epidemiology Center, said one of the causes for the delay in the disbursement of the stipend for RN Heals nurses was that the money “was not in the original budget of the DOH" approved by Congress. The RN Heals program was designed to ease unemployment woes among an estimated 200,000 registered nurses unable to find work in local hospitals. The rural nurses are seen as the front-liners in delivering the basic health services component of the government’s Conditional Cash Transfer program. These services include deworming, immunization, vaccination, and maternal and child services. Filipino nurses need at least two years of full-time employment in a local tertiary hospital to qualify for employment abroad. – YA, GMA News