Three cases of professionals who should not be vaccinated for not having worked in contact with COVID-19 are those that have been known today at the Hospital Santiago de Vitoria-Gasteiz: a commission of celadores, a supervising endoscopy and a member of the UGT liberated union. In contrast, some workers who are in direct contact with patients infected with the virus have not yet received the vaccine: Some ICU worker, physiotherapists in rehabilitation with contagion or several cellators, among them the department that has prepared specifically for the care of COVID-19 patients, among others. ARGIA has been able to know and confirm the information through sources of hospital staff.

Rumours and anger of workers

During the previous days, there was speculation with the professionals of the Hospital of Santiago that, both by word and by telephone, “some managers and members of trade unions” had been vaccinated against the criteria of the protocol. According to ARGIA sources, discomfort and discomfort among workers were already evident, among other causes, due to high workloads and working conditions, and the rumor deepened the discomfort: “We’re very emotionally bad.”

In this context, the company committee of the Hospital de Santiago de Vitoria-Gasteiz requested an urgent meeting to the management of OSI Araba on Tuesday (OSI Araba includes the hospitals of Txagorritxu and Santiago, external consultations of Álava and outpatient clinics). The meeting between the management and the trade union representatives took place this Wednesday at noon at the Euskalduna Palace. ARGIA spoke with two of the trade unions present, Manu Rodríguez de ESK and Olatz Rodríguez de Yurre de LAB.

Poor management, poor organisation

The Directorate approved at the meeting the three cases of erroneous vaccination referred to, which are the result of errors in the implementation of the protocol. It has also explained its intention to readjust the protocol and correct the errors detected in it. Both ESK and LAB consider that the facts of the hospital are not so much prevarication or corruption, but are a consequence of "very poor management".

As explained, workers are being called by units to get the vaccine since they're on the front line, but there are some gaps and problems going on. On the one hand, differences within the working group are not being taken into account: some of the workers are in direct contact with the virus and others are not, but they are all called at once. According to the representative of ESK, this is the case of the cellator in charge of the vaccine and the endoscopy monitor. On the other hand, there are cases in which the formal composition of the staff ratio of each unit does not correspond to reality, which is not being considered: “Priority units have been seen and the staff has been taken into account, regardless of whether they are working or not, and where,” explained Rodríguez de Yur, of LAB. For example, a worker who works in the ICU has not received the vaccine because he belongs to a unit that is not officially on the front line, and the same may happen, on the contrary, for a worker who is formally in a front-line unit to receive an insertion call when he is actually in a safe position. It has also been recommended to the professionals who are on leave to join their unit, or also to the liberated trade unions. The latter would be the case of the UGT trade unionist, who is a cellator of the unit that is on the front line. The representative of ESK says that these problems are generic, not only from the Hospital of Santiago.

Another issue is the attitude and personal responsibility of each professional regarding the call for insertion. “My feeling is that sometimes it’s an attitude, ‘as I’ve been called, I’m not going to say no,’” says Rodríguez de Yur de LAB. The ESK representative believes that special care should be taken to analyse the cases: “You’re off at home, they call you to insert it, and if you tell them no, ‘Ah, don’t you want to insert it then?’

The leadership of OSI Araba committed itself at this Wednesday’s meeting to modify and improve the protocols. The trade unions had asked him to give a written explanation of the mistakes and misvaccinations that had been made so far, in order to relax the hospital environment. From the management point of view, they were not very willing, arguing that giving unsolicited explanations could be interpreted as accepting guilt.

Political responsibilities

The case of the vaccination protocol has been particularly heated in the CAV since the unjust vaccinations were known in the hospitals of Basurto and Santa Marina. Gotzone Sagardui, condemned for the scandal, appeared this Wednesday in the Basque Parliament to explain his situation. Rodríguez believes that Sagardui and “some media” want to hide the responsibilities of the Basque Government and of the main leaders of Osakidetza, matching all levels of responsibility and facts and fuelling the “witch hunt” among the workers. He believes that they are getting it on a level, because there is outrage at the corrupt and irresponsible, but also the tensions and mistrust between colleagues: “Why have you and I not been vaccinated, why?”

Against this background, he stressed the importance of differentiation: “The wild boar has been premeditated and made with alevosy. In other cases, management has been very bad, but unintentional or malicious.” The latter are also in favour of studying them and demanding personal responsibilities. On the other hand, however, he believes that the political responsibilities must be demanded of the top leaders of Osakidetza at the level of the CAPV and the political leaders, “starting with Sagardui, who has done nothing but take responsibility of others in Parliament”. Sagardui explained in the Basque Parliament that he has investigated how the vaccine protocol is being carried out throughout Osakidetza after hearing the cases of Basurto and Santa Marina. He made no reference to the Hospital Santiago de Vitoria-Gasteiz.