Med techs strike forcing shutdown of Blood Bank, National Public Health Lab and KPH lab

Operations at the Blood Bank, the National Public Health Lab and the Kingston Public Hospital laboratory have been crippled as medical technologists are on strike over the non-payment of retroactive salaries for the 2015-17 contract period.

General Secretary of the Union of Technical, Administrative and Supervisory Personnel (UTASP), St Patrice Ennis, told The Gleaner/Power 106 News Centre that the medical technologists were promised their retroactive payments in their February's salary.

However, Ennis says only a few of the workers received payment and those who were paid received incorrect sums.

The UTASP general secretary explains that the medical technologists had signed off on an agreement for the payment of the retroactive salary in January.

However, he says the payment was not made.

He says in a subsequent meeting with the Ministry of Health the workers were promised that the payments would be honoured in February's salary.

However, that payment deadline was also missed.

Ennis says the medical technologists, who analyse and process all blood and tissue samples for the island's public health facilities, are not prepared to wait any longer for their retroactive payments.