About 800 Tshwane Aids community health workers have been left in the lurch without jobs after the city terminated their contracts and appointed new recruits, according to a Sowetan report. The health workers work in the municipality's Aids unit programme – a multi-sectoral Aids management unit – which involves door-to-door visits to HIV/Aids-affected households and to ensure that outpatients take their ARV drugs regularly.
The workers are quoted in the report as saying that the City of Tshwane terminated their contracts in August and they were promised they would sign new ones three months later. But they were surprised to see new recruits doing their work from Monday. The health workers, who earn between R2,000 and R2,500 a month, said they were expecting to be called to sign new contracts as had been the case for more than 10 years.
The report says some of the workers have more than 15 years working as community health workers and now they are left without jobs.
[link url="https://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/south-africa/2020-01-08-health-workers-jobless-after-tshwane-ends-deal/"]Sowetan report[/link]