Petrina Francis, Staff Reporter

The Nurses' Association of Jamaica (NAJ) yesterday revealed that some nurses have been delivering babies without being certified to do so and that it has instructed them to stop immediately.

"The nurses who remain at Level One, who are delivering babies will no longer be able to do it because they are not employed at that level and it is a legal situation which they can be sued for," NAJ President Edith Allwood-Anderson, told journalists yesterday.

Mrs. Allwood-Anderson said Level One nurses have been assisting in these areas because of the 50 per cent shortage of nurses.

("But) It is a legal framework I have asked them (the Government) to deal with and they have just dismissed it," she said. "Even the very ministry (of Health) that should be protecting that kind of thing has made no comment on it."

The NAJ called an emergency meeting yesterday with its members after negotiations broke down with the Finance Ministry on Thursday.

The nurses have been pressing the Government for an 80 per cent increase in the first year and 40 per cent in the second year. They have now reduced this to 19 per cent in the first year and five per cent in the second year. But Mrs. Allwood-Anderson said the Government said it could only offer them 22 per cent over two years.

The Government says it will refer the case to the Industrial Disputes Tribunal (IDT) but the NAJ president remains adamant that the NAJ will not go that route.

"We will resist any attempt to send us to the arbitration to delay it (the negotiations). We want this settled before the next election," she added.

In the meantime, the NAJ president said nurses would no longer be doing (overtime) sessions.

Dr. Trevor McCartney, senior medical officer at the Kingston Public Hospital, told The Gleaner Power 106 news that this could have a severe impact on the health sector as hospitals depend on sessions as there are not enough nurses to work the shifts.

Mrs. Allwood-Anderson's comments yesterday came ahead of of a meeting with the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, at which it was hoped the matter could finally be brought to a close.

"We are going there with an open mind because we are very careful not to smile and propagandise any line from the ministry, for them to feel that we are carrying their propaganda," she said.