Trade Union of Public Employees in Health and Social Services (Sağlık-Sen) Chairman Semih Durmuş, who shared the report with the public, stated that violence in health has increased to a high priority occupational risk level with the pandemic and said, “It is possible to come across all kinds of violence, from physical violence to verbal attacks, from threatening attacks to harassment in health units or field studies. From a knife to a gun, from a chair to a saw, from a sickle to a cologne bottle, anything imaginable can be used as a tool of violence.”
“SOCIAL AWARENESS IS THE SOLUTION TO VIOLENCE”
Stating that the first thing to be done about violence in health is social awareness, “Undoubtedly, the final solution to the problem will be possible when the awareness that will be formed in the society sees its peak. Society, namely 84 millions should interiorize that health workers also carry lives, that they die to save lives, that they undertake the sacred responsibility of saving life, that should stretch arms for them instead of raising hands, that the health care service is a team work and that bad behavior towards a healthcare worker affects all healthcare professionals, and that the healthcare system is a whole with its employees and patients. Of course, it is not only the Ministry of Health who is responsible for this issue. What the Ministry should do in the short term is to review the current preventive, disincentive and protectionist policies and practices,” Durmuş added.
Stating that 2021, which was declared the year of healthcare workers, was spent in the shadow of violence to healthcare workers, Durmuş said, “We see that violence has peaked in the last month of 2021, in December. There were 31 incidents of violence against healthcare workers in this month. In the incidents caused by 57 attackers, 50 health workers became victims. During the year 2021, there were 190 violent incidents. In the incidents carried out by 364 attackers, 316 healthcare workers became victims of violence.”