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Indybay Feature

Filipino nurses face trumped-up charges in New York

by wsws (reposted)
Wednesday, January 30, 2008 :Ten Filipino nurses are facing trial on criminal charges of endangering patients at a nursing home in New York’s Suffolk County. The accusations stem from the nurses’ decision to walk off their jobs in April 2006 to protest broken promises and unacceptable working conditions at the Avalon Gardens Rehabilitation and Health Care Center in Smithtown, Long Island.
The Suffolk County District Attorney admits that no patients suffered any harm and that such charges have never been brought against nurses in New York State.

The attack on these skilled and relatively higher-paid immigrant workers highlights the precarious conditions and lack of basic rights of millions of immigrants in the US, even those, like these nurses, who come with badly needed skills and full legal status.

The nurses were brought to the US in November 2005, after being recruited by a Filipino agency closely associated with SentosaCare, a large for-profit chain of nursing homes in New York. They were part of a federally sanctioned immigration program largely designed to deal with a critical shortage of nurses in the US. Filipino nurses, highly trained and English speaking, have helped to fill the gap. In the US they have the chance to earn about $5,000 monthly, compared to only $200 in the Philippines. According to an analysis of Census Bureau data cited by the New York Times, 30 percent of the 215,000 Filipinos in the New York area work as nurses or other health care professionals. Counting their families, these health care workers make up a majority of the immigrant Filipino population.

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Many Filipinos set out their sights on working overseas like New York for example. They are hoping for the best and yet the challenges are never ending. I feel bad for the so called " Sentosa27" nurses who are now undergoing a tedious trial; one of them is even a board topnotcher. I believe that the Filipino agencies are making money out of their own countrymen. It's just sad that in order to go abroad you have to spend a fortune; and when your there your treated like dirt. The plight of nurses here in the Philippines is far worst than those already working abroad. For example , a nurse who works in a private hospital is paid P4,000 a MONTH . I am a nurse myself but somehow i feel really bad both for myself and other nurses who are still struggling to get out of the country; but the saddest part is that it is our fellow Filipinos are the ones who makes life even harder for us especially the agencies."Sometimes , we Filipinos think that the US is heaven only to find out that it is also hell , only with a lesser temperature than the Philippines. At age 23, i'm not yet eager to go abroad nor work as a nurse in the Philippines. Life is short , i' m going to do what i want and pursue my dream instead of having a successful business. Hard isn't it? Well, i'll tell you something with what i have gone through just to finish nursing and pass the board... I'm not eager to work in a hospital. .. i'ts depressing.
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