Nurses live under the poverty line

Iran Press News: Translation by Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi

Based on reports from the regime-run student news agency, ISNA, Mohammad Sharifi-Moqadam, the Director of the Nurses' Association indicated that though the nursing duties in private wards are much more complicated and time-consuming than a public ward, the nurses in private wards are still not paid enough and are therefore living under the poverty line. Sharifi-Moqadam said that the legal minimum wage is approximately $136 per month, which a large majority of the nurses in private wards do receive though they are deprived of any sort of benefits. He stated that the nurses in private wards have the lowest pay rate in the legal employment scales and unfortunately though their jobs are considered among the most difficult and dangerous, they are still not entitled to any time off or early retirement. READ MORE

Sharifi-Moqadam also added that work pressure for nurses is much more than that of an average job, working in one of the worst areas with little in return. Nurses also do not seem to have any job security because the majority of private hospitals only hire nurses under temporary contracts which forces them to accept any work condition.

Expressing his deep concern over these working conditions, Sharifi-Moqadam stressed the need for serious restructuring of these issues as nurses cannot even subsist with these types of wages; he added that at present nurses who work in private hospitals (let alone those who work in public hospitals) live under the poverty level, hungry, physically exhausted, depressed and there seems to be no improvements in sight.