The state-run newspaper Donya-e-Eqtesad, in a report titled “Nurses Between Heaven and Earth,” quoted Mohammad Sharifi-Moghaddam, Secretary-General of the Nurses’ Association, as saying that the Ministry of Health is neglecting the real rights of nurses, and the new health minister has yet to take any meaningful action.
In its October 10 report, Donya-e-Eqtesad wrote that for nearly 17 years, no one has listened to the nurses, and despite paying a large portion of their claims, it is unclear what the situation in the nursing community is like.
The newspaper highlighted these questions: Will the annual migration of 2,000 nurses decrease? Will 50,000 newly graduated nurses join Iran’s nursing community each year? And will nurses who are currently working for Snapp (a popular ride-hailing service in Iran) return to hospitals?
The newspaper’s focus on these questions is because nurses’ issues go beyond unpaid wages. A nursing activist told Donya-e-Eqtesad: “It is still unclear; the nursing committee that was supposed to be formed in the parliament—where has it gone, and which of the demands are currently being followed up?”
Sharifi-Moghaddam also told the newspaper: “Some of the payments made so far have been related to overdue mandatory overtime,” and he emphasized that this mandatory overtime was against the nurses’ will.
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According to Sharifi-Moghaddam, one of the main demands of the nurses is the full implementation of nursing services, which was approved by the parliament in 2007.
The Secretary-General of the Nurses’ Association also stressed that five or six staff members, from nurses to head nurses, are involved in caring for a single patient. He added that their total wage for each patient is 2.7 million rials (approximately 4.4 USD), of which 14% goes to the hospital director.
He added: “In the current situation of the nursing community in Iran, many people take the nursing entrance exam to prepare for migration, while many nurses are changing professions and working for Snapp. Fifty thousand have graduated, but they are not being employed.”
Javad Tavakoli, a member of the regime’s Central Council of the Nurses’ Association and a member of the Nursing Board of Mashhad, posted on X: “The Ministry of Health continues to either not hear or not understand the nurses’ demands.”
Tavakoli added: “Nurses are saying our issue is removing service barriers. The formula for calculating overtime wages and special rates needs to be changed. The Ministry of Health keeps saying they are paying overdue overtime wages (200,000 rials per hour, equivalent to 32 cents) and a very minimal rate.”
In recent months, nurses have held nationwide strikes and labor protests in response to the failure to implement the tariff law, mandatory overtime, and meager wages, which have received widespread support from labor unions.
