With huge pressure on Tasmania’s emergency departments, it beggars belief the Liberals are proposing cuts to nursing staff at the Royal Hobart Hospital’s Emergency Medical Unit. This is the stark reality of the Liberals’ $700 million cuts to health.
Nurses in EMU do vital work, providing care to patients who need monitoring and treatment while waiting for transfer or discharge. Emergency departments are already overflowing with patients waiting too long, and ambulances are ramped and unable to respond to emergencies. To cut a unit which actually helps to reduce ambulance ramping, emergency department overcrowding and bed block is as astonishing as it is irresponsible.
The Minister for Health has constantly denied the Liberals are making cuts to health services, despite their budget stating in black and white that they intend to make $700 million in “savings”. She’s also denied there will be cuts to frontline services. This is spin of the highest order.
Given how often the Minister talks about the Federal Government’s responsibility for improving bed block, you’d think she’d understand that retaining this unit’s capacity is vital to improve hospital access and flow. But when questioned by the Greens in Parliament, she refused to reverse the cuts.
The Minister for Health denied that there would be cuts to EMU beds. But behind every bed is a nurse, caring for the person in it. Less nurses mean less beds for those who need them. This decision, based on a flawed benchmark, shows just how out of touch decision makers are with the reality of what’s happening in our hospitals.
This decision will mean more people waiting for ambulances while they’re ramped, and longer wait times in the Emergency Department. It’s only going to cause harm to patients, and to the staff already stretched thin trying to give them the care they need.
The Greens will continue to stand behind the ANMF who are today stopping work over these proposed cuts. Our health system is in crisis, and it needs real solutions – not cuts to funding and staff.
