"One of the nurses' demands, with this petition, is that they be granted the possibility of retiring at 55 years old, as is already the case with several other professions", said the SE in a statement.

With this petition, which has 15,174 validated signatures, the Nurses Union hopes that "the Government recognizes a fair right for nurses"

After delivering a petition with more than 30 thousand signatures in 2023, "the largest ever in the Health area", the Nurses Union hopes that "finally the Government and Portuguese deputies recognize all the risk associated" with the profession and the constant wear and tear that professionals are subject to on a daily basis, says the president of the SE, Pedro Costa, quoted in the statement.

Pedro Costa recalls that in the last legislature, interrupted halfway through with the resignation of the Prime Minister, Parliament created a working group to evaluate this demand.

"The truth is that for about five years no visible work of this group was known, nor the conclusions that they may have eventually reached and that should have been delivered to the Assembly of the Republic by December 2023", he emphasizes

For Eduardo Bernardino, SE leader and first subscriber of the petition, "it makes no sense to continue to postpone this decision".

"Referring the matter back to a working group to study the possible application of this measure to a set of professions is just another excuse to postpone this matter again", argues Eduardo Bernardino.

Pedro Costa emphasizes that "nurses are subject to a lot of pressure, they exercise a profession with high complexity and in which they have to deal constantly with illness and even death, in addition to all the difficulty of dealing with patients and family in moments of extreme fragility".

He also highlights the growing number of overtime hours that nurses have to do every month, often without even being able to enjoy the mandatory rest days by law.

"A 24/24h work schedule is practiced, in the form of day and night shifts, and with physical and emotional consequences", says the president of the SE, noting that "it has been proven, since 2016, that one in five nurses feels emotionally exhausted, which has worsened even more with the pandemic".

"Nurses are exhausted and unmotivated with all the daily demands that are not reflected, right away, in the remuneration conditions", says Pedro Costa, hoping that the deputies recognize the urgency of nursing being considered a high-risk profession and rapid wear and tear, thus changing the minimum retirement age.

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