Sylhet Bureau :
Members of the Health Assistant Association in Sylhet held a 3-hour sit-in programme from 8 am on Tuesday (July 8). The Bangladesh Health Assistant Association Central Demand Implementation Coordination Committee organized this program on the road in front of the Sylhet Civil Surgeon’s Office. The health assistants held a peaceful sit-in program to implement the 6-point demand.
At this time, the speakers said, ‘We, the health assistants, provide vaccinations at the grassroots level as a preventable vaccine to protect human children from 10 deadly diseases since birth. Although our work of providing this vaccination is completely technical, we are deprived of technical status.’
They said, ‘Although they have been demanding technical status for a long time, the health assistants are facing extreme salary discrimination from the employees of all other government departments as the concerned department has not implemented it.
Despite all the international achievements in the health sector through us, they have only received messages of hope. There has been no change in their fate.’
They demanded the implementation of 6-point demands including amending the recruitment rules, adding the educational qualification of Bachelor’s (Science) to the 14th grade and upgrading the technical status to the 11th grade through in-service diploma training. The speakers said that the grassroots level healthcare of the country will be stronger and more sustainable through the implementation of the 6-points. The implementation of the recommendations proposed by the department and the issuance of necessary notifications to eliminate the long-standing discrimination is now the demand of the health assistants. The speakers expressed hope that the government would implement their proposed six-point demands, considering the appeal of the country’s 26,000 health assistants who are victims of discrimination. Association President Md. Abdus Salam said that before the program, the concerned authorities were informed about the demands and program through a memorandum and application. If the authorities do not implement the demands quickly as promised, the implementation of all activities, including EPI, will be stopped from September 1. The six-point demands proposed by the health assistants are – Amendment of the recruitment rules in the executive order to provide 14th grade by adding the educational qualification of Bachelor’s (Science), Upgrading the salary scale to 11th grade with technical rank through in-service diploma training, Continuously ensuring the next higher grade in case of promotion, Assimilation of all working health assistants and health inspectors to the graduate pass scale in light of the experience of health assistants and health inspectors even if they are appointed according to the previous recruitment rules, Adding the number of time scales or higher grades that health assistants, assistant health inspectors, and health inspectors have received or are entitled to before the promotion in the salary scale to the next re-determined salary scale, Considering health assistants, assistant health inspectors, and health inspectors who have previously completed the in-service diploma SIT course as diploma holders and directly providing them with 11th grade.
