The Minister of Justice and Public Order sent a list of doctors who often write sick leaves to prison guards to the PIS, in order to control the phenomenon of frequent and long absence of prison officers with sick leave.
The letter, according to information from "F", includes at least four doctors who seem to write sick leaves to prison staff on a frequent basis and in some cases for long periods of time. The purpose of transmitting the names to the president of the Pancyprian Medical Association, Petros Agathangelou, is to intervene with its members so that they do not give sick leaves without a good reason, and to stop the phenomenon of many prison guards being absent on sick leave, which acts to the detriment of their colleagues.
The issue with the sick leaves of prison staff arose after a Report by the Audit Office, which recorded a number of irregularities in the granting of leaves by doctors. The report pointed out that the same doctor allegedly gave sick leave en masse to prison guards for various reasons, while doctors of another specialty gave leaves for diseases that were not of their specialty.
From the study of files, it became clear that members of the staff were absent for long periods of time and while they had to be referred to a Medical Council, the request was pending for years. The Audit Office has already sent data to the Attorney General to investigate the incidents identified for any criminal liability.
However, the issue with sick leaves in general in the public sector has not been closed since Kostas Fytiris, as he stated yesterday to KYPE, will reopen it in September in order to attempt a legal regulation. The Minister of Justice stated that he will meet again with the unions on the issue, after the conclusion of the discussions with the other ministries concerned for the formulation of the final proposal.
On the same issue, the General Secretary of PASYDY, Stratis Mattheou, stated that our concern is not to affect rights concerning chronic patients who need sick leave, but to focus on those individual cases where there are abuses.
