“One of the nurses' demands, with this petition, is that they be granted the possibility of retiring from the age of 55, as is already the case with several other professions”, says the SEP in a statement.

With this petition, which has 15,174 validated signatures, the Nurses Union hopes that “the Government recognises a fair right for nurses”

After delivering a petition in 2023 with more than 30 thousand signatures, “the largest ever in the area of Health”, the Nurses Union hopes that “finally the Government and Portuguese deputies recognise all the risk associated” with the profession and the constant wear and tear that professionals are subject to on a daily basis, says the president of the SEP, Pedro Costa, quoted in the statement.

Pedro Costa recalls that in the last legislature, interrupted halfway through with the resignation of the Prime Minister, Parliament created a working group to evaluate this demand.

“The truth is that for around five years there was no visible work by this group nor the conclusions they eventually reached and which should have been delivered to the Assembly of the Republic by December 2023”, he highlights

For Eduardo Bernardino, leader of the SEP and first signer of the petition, “It makes no sense to continue postponing this decision any longer”.

Pedro Costa highlights that “nurses are subject to great pressure, they carry out a highly complex profession in which they have to constantly deal with illness and even death, in addition to all the difficulty involved in dealing with patients and the family in moments of extreme fragility.”


Overtime

It also highlights that the number of overtime hours that nurses have to work every month is increasing, often without even being able to take advantage of the rest days required by law.

“A 24/24-hour working schedule is practiced, in the form of day and night shifts, and with physical and emotional consequences”, maintains the president of the SE, noting that “it has been proven, since 2016, that one in every five nurses feels emotional exhaustion, which has become even worse with the pandemic.”

“Nurses are exhausted and unmotivated with all the daily demands that are not reflected, in the first place, in their remuneration conditions”, says Pedro Costa, hoping that deputies recognise the urgency of nursing being considered a high-risk and fast-wearing profession, thus changing the minimum retirement age.