Attacks on health workers, d’Alba (Federsanità): “Raise the level of penalties for violent people”

“Whoever enters an emergency room must respect the place and those who work there. But militarization, another proposal put forward in recent days, if we live it as a strengthening of police stations in emergency rooms is fine, but we cannot ‘close ourselves’. The bill on Daspo? However, I believe that it violates a constitutional right of citizens. Here the issue is to raise the level of punishment for those who commit crimes, even with the instrument of deferred arrest. We need to send a signal to our professionals, the country system considers them as something precious and provides a system of rules that protect them“. He explains it to Adnkronos Salute Fabrizio from Albapresident of Federsanità and general director of the Policlinico Umberto I in Rome.

“Today we return to the topic of assaults which unfortunately – he underlines – has never left the agenda. The event that took place at the Policlinico of Foggia to the detriment of health workers goes beyond this phenomenon because it has aspects of crime. What happened in Foggia relaunches the problem and it is clear that we must raise the level and strength of the responses to be implemented – continues d’Alba – With respect to the proposals that have emerged, I would not discard any of them a priori, they need to be analyzed. I am a health technician who today presides over an association that brings together health companies and municipalities.: we must not forget that as companies of the National Health Service we must always be open with our emergency rooms and welcome citizens. We are preparing and interfacing in a moment of problematic and fragile population and we cannot limit access to health facilities, as feared by some”.

Federsanità and Fiaso are carrying out a joint roundtable on the major issues of public health, including that of attacks on workers. “It is necessary to contextualize the interventions – specifies d’Alba – to create the conditions so that the phenomenon of violence, but also verbal violence, is reduced in places of assistance. To understand where they are ‘children’ of hardships and other types of problems, because there is a broad responsibility that goes beyond health and requires absolutely structured responses. We are committed to bringing some concrete proposals to the Government. Today many of the interventions made in the recent past on the issue of measures against aggression are not known and are not clearly visible. It is a different thing if the police intervene and with the help of the images from our cameras go to the home of the person who committed the crime and arrest him. There is a greater deterrent force” than fines.

At Umberto I, have you succeeded in this work? “We have recently seen an improvement, the police station has become permanent and 24 hours a day. And over time we have organized initiatives dedicated to training people on techniques to dissuade the escalation of aggressiveness of patients. It has not solved the problem, but it has given us some results”, concludes d’Alba.