Romania: hospital staff not up to the task?

Romania's healthcare system was suffering from brain drain even before the corona crisis. Now the country is also suffering from massive shortages of protective equipment. Local media report that medical staff are refusing to work in some hospitals. Is this understandable or irresponsible? National media take different views.

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Digi 24 (RO) /

Doctors duty-bound to make sacrifices for others

Commenting on news site Digi 24, journalist Lucian Mîndruță sees the attempts of health professionals to escape their duties as immoral:

“From New York I see pictures in which doctors and nursing staff are using rubbish bags as protective aprons. Here, people are making excuses and running away. Yet hospital staff are always in mortal danger. Most of them usually get away with it. Now the staff must choose: Do they want to escape by helping others or escape by hiding? ... My heart and respect belong to those who risk their lives to save others. Don't you all want to live in a country that functions like the West? Then think of the moral values that exist there. Two of those values are courage and making sacrifices for others.”

Moise.ro (RO) /

Isolation after a shift at the hospital

Only a fraction of the medical and nursing staff are taking part in the action, writes business journalist Moise Guran in his blog moise.ro:

“How can we talk about the phenomenon of desertion among medical staff when under 100 people - or perhaps 0.1 percent of medical staff - have left so far? ... Many have also withdrawn their notices to quit. This shows that they just wanted to raise the alarm. Shouldn't we be talking instead about the 99.9 percent who stayed? They are the real phenomenon! A military regulation is now to provide accommodation for staff who don't want to risk infecting their families. Yes, they are human beings too, and some have old people at home. They are more aware than we are that they'll inevitably get infected. ... This is not a film or a documentary, it's the present and it's damned real!”