The Philippine government has been failing to give allowances, among other benefits, to nurses in Virac, Catanduanes, a lawmaker said on Friday.

Rep. Teddy Casiño of Bayan Muna party-list, chairman of the House Committee on Small Businesses and Entrepreneurship, disclosed that 95 registered nurses in Virac have been complaining of two to three weeks of delay in allowances as well as P2,000 worth of unpaid additional allowances and meals.

These nurses work under the state’s Registered Nurses for Health Enhancement and Local Service (RN-Heals) program, a training and development project for currently unemployed nurses for the improvement of local health systems and support for the country’s attainment of Millennium Development Goals targets.

Those employed under the RN-Heals initiative are entitled with a monthly allowance worth P8,000 and are supervised by a local government unit. Likewise, government agencies are encouraged to provide each RN-Heals nurse with additional allowances and benefits worth at least P2,000 and hospitals are mandated to provide them meals of P2,000 a month.

Upon completion of the RN-Heals program, the nurses would receive a Certificate of Competency and Deployment.

“Congress should look into the plight and working conditions of registered nurses which negatively affect their morale and dignity as professionals based on the Philippine Nursing Act and the magna carta of public health workers,” Casiño pointed out.

The Bayan Muna lawmaker was referring to Section 10 of the Magna Carta of Public Health Workers, which states that there should be no understaffing or overloading of public health workers and that the ratio of a health staff-to-patient load should be such as to reasonably effect a sustained delivery of quality health care at all times without overworking the public health worker and over extending his or her duty and service.