Four Million Shots In A Single Day

[JJReyes]

The latest report shows 4,081,959 doses of the coronavirus vaccine were administered during a 24 hours period in the United States.  The average for the past week is 3 million per day. One reason for the rapid increase is the involvement of neighborhood drugstores with the vaccination effort.  The biggest group is CVS Health with 9,941 stores in 2019.  CVS Health alone has the capacity to administer 20-25 million shots a month.

I wanted to find out if this is done out of patriotism or profit motivated.  While my two shots were free for me under government programs, someone had to be paid to administer it.  For Covid-19 vaccine administration services furnished before March 15, the Medicare payment rate for a single dose was $28.39.  It is now $40.00.  If you do the math, for 20 million shots a month, CVS Health alone could receive $800 million in compensation.  

Medical professional recruiters in the Philippines are demanding the lifting of the deployment embargo imposed by the government.  Doctors and nurses are threatening work stoppage because they are overworked and underpaid.  Rumors are circulating that some Philippine hospitals can no longer accept new patients because they don't have staff.  The holy grail for most Filipinos is working in the United States.  So how much are nurses being paid during the pandemic?

According to the New York Post, recently retired nurses are being enticed to temporary positions to administer vaccinations.  The rate is $70 an hour for a 40-hour week ($2,800) plus a stipend of $2,200 or a total of $5,000.  That's $20,000 a month to administer the vaccine!  The prime staffing nurses working the Covid-19 hospital wards are typically paid $110 to $120 per hour, plus stipend, plus housing which is usually in a nearby hotel.  But they can't find enough nurses!  The US government might therefore issue temporary, medical emergency visas.  So help us!  We need Philippine nurses.

[scott h]

5 hours ago, JJReyes said:

So how much are nurses being paid during the pandemic?

This last week cna (channel news asia) out of Singapore has been running an expose (sort of like 60 minutes) on the plight of the nurses here.  the show is called "asia undercover". It has not been uploaded to their Utube channel yet or I would give a link. To summarize they are supposed to be paid by national law a minimum wage of about 15 dollars a day (if memory serves) but most are payed about 12 (no enforce). During this crisis another national law was passed AND FUNDED to give each nurse an additional 500 pesos a day hazard pay. But according to the story almost 15k nurses have yet to receive it.

Why?

Again, according to the story, years ago the national government made a law that gave spending control to the LGU's. So all the hazard pay money went to the LGU's never gave it to the nurses.

Over the years I have found this channel to be pretty reliable. 

[scott h]

5 hours ago, JJReyes said:

I wanted to find out if this is done out of patriotism or profit motivated.

As Ronald Regan once said, "There you go again" 

The traditional view is that capitalism IS patriotism.

Though this have fallen out of favor recently 

[JJReyes]

1 hour ago, scott h said:

This last week cna (channel news asia) out of Singapore has been running an expose (sort of like 60 minutes) on the plight of the nurses here.  the show is called "asia undercover". It has not been uploaded to their Utube channel yet or I would give a link. To summarize they are supposed to be paid by national law a minimum wage of about 15 dollars a day (if memory serves) but most are payed about 12 (no enforce). During this crisis another national law was passed AND FUNDED to give each nurse an additional 500 pesos a day hazard pay. But according to the story almost 15k nurses have yet to receive it.

Why?

Again, according to the story, years ago the national government made a law that gave spending control to the LGU's. So all the hazard pay money went to the LGU's never gave it to the nurses.

Over the years I have found this channel to be pretty reliable. 

I am in no way justifying the practice, but the treatment of nurses in the Philippines is similar to going through a US Marine Corp boot camp.  The goal of every nursing student and the families that support them is overseas deployment to the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Ireland, Germany, Saudi Arabia, etc.  They can earn salaries to support families at home until, hopefully in the West, they can petition to get family members to join them.  Long hours typically means 12 hour shifts and during this pandemic, seven days a week in the Philippines.  Low salaries means not paying them what was promised.  What can you do?  Sue a government health clinic or hospital.  It is better to keep quiet, get the signatures on the paperwork and letters of commendation before applying for overseas work.

Anyway, these nurses want to go overseas to earn lots of money so the Philippine attitude is we can take advantage in the meantime.  When I try explaining government condoned corruption, this is one example I use.  

[Jollygoodfellow]

22 hours ago, JJReyes said:

So help us!  We need Philippine nurses.

Maybe you do but they are needed here too. If other countries take them all who will help us living here in the Philippines? 

[JJReyes]

19 minutes ago, Jollygoodfellow said:

Maybe you do but they are needed here too. If other countries take them all who will help us living here in the Philippines? 

The Philippine policy is difficult to understand.  The nursing schools currently graduate about 90,000 a year.  The nursing board makes the national examination so difficult that only one third receive their registered nurse credentials after the first attempt.  An additional requirement, knowns as "practicum" is working for a clinic or hospital for one year without pay.  The prestige, private hospitals at one time charged new nurses a fee to work for them for free!  This practice has been stopped.  

The only way to recover the cost of education, the training expense by providing free labor, etc. is to work overseas.  To keep them at home, current government policy tells them they can't leave because they are needed.  Local pay scale is so low nurses cannot hope to repay the debt during their lifetime.  The nurses are indentured servants.  The policy increases frustration and results in threats of work stoppage.  The solution is double their salary; pay the stipends they were promised; improve the working conditions.  This is what's happening in the United States.  The per hour wage was increased.  The hospitals and local communities provide incentives like free food and lodging at a nearby hotel.  (It's also a way to prevent infecting family members.)

[scott h]

7 hours ago, Jollygoodfellow said:

Maybe you do but they are needed here too

But a lot just plain will not work here. A lot, if for some reason they can not work overseas, work as call agents.

Another example is the other day at the casino, 2 of the 4 dealers at the crap table were nurses. I asked why..the answer was money. They make 1200 pesos a day at the casino and 600 as a starting nurse. 

3 of my 4 nieces are nurses, 1 is not an Australian citizen and 2 are US citizens. The 4th is an IT grad and followed her sister to OZ.

[Mike J]

8 hours ago, JJReyes said:

The solution is double their salary; pay the stipends they were promised; improve the working conditions

i am not sure that doubling salary, increasing benefits working conditions, etc. is a solution when the primary problem seems to be a "supply and demand" imbalance.  Too many people want to be nurses and not enough positions for the new graduates to receive on the job training.  Further complicated because the new graduates cannot get work overseas without experience so the nursing glut stays here in the Philippines.  The result is an oversupply of graduates who struggle to find employment as nurses.  Doubling the salary might actually make the problem worse as you would make nursing school even more attractive as a profession, which increases the supply side, while the demand side stays relatively flat.   Just my opinion of course (and worth every penny you paid for it). 

[JJReyes]

4 minutes ago, Mike J said:

i am not sure that doubling salary, increasing benefits working conditions, etc. is a solution when the primary problem seems to be a "supply and demand" imbalance.  Too many people want to be nurses and not enough positions for the new graduates to receive on the job training.  Further complicated because the new graduates cannot get work overseas without experience so the nursing glut stays here in the Philippines.  The result is an oversupply of graduates who struggle to find employment as nurses.  Doubling the salary might actually make the problem worse as you would make nursing school even more attractive as a profession, which increases the supply side, while the demand side stays relatively flat.   Just my opinion of course (and worth every penny you paid for it). 

There are pros and cons both ways.  My proposal for the Philippines is a tiered system whereby a two years nursing graduate receives certification as a caregiver, assuming they run out of money or encounter academic difficulties.  Caregivers will be badly needed for the domestic and international aging population who want to relocate to the Philippines for inexpensive assistance (me!).  Nurses who prefer to be employed in the Philippines don't need the one year practice required by foreign governments before employment.  The requirements for registered nurses and those planning to work overseas remains the same.

On paper, the compensation seems acceptable.  Nurses will tell you that after "contributions" it is much less.  The current policy is the government won't allow nurses to leave because they are needed for the pandemic.  Fear of contracting the virus and insufficient salary means hospital are undermanned.  

[BC57]

On 4/4/2021 at 11:35 PM, JJReyes said:

The latest report shows 4,081,959 doses of the coronavirus vaccine were administered during a 24 hours period in the United States.  The average for the past week is 3 million per day. One reason for the rapid increase is the involvement of neighborhood drugstores with the vaccination effort.  The biggest group is CVS Health with 9,941 stores in 2019.  CVS Health alone has the capacity to administer 20-25 million shots a month.

 

more fake news.