UPDATE2: PM: Russia to pay 7 bln rbl to social workers fighting COVID-19

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MOSCOW, May 18 (PRIME) -- The Russian government will allocate more than 7 billion rubles of additional payments to more than 114,000 social workers fighting with the COVID-19, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said on Monday.

"After a meeting on the epidemiologic situation held on May 11, the president ordered the government to amend legislation to provide additional payments to the employees of social organizations who continue working in conditions of a spread of the coronavirus infection in senior housing and other organizations of the kind," Mishustin said.

He said that the order was signed.

Mishustin also said that the Russian government will discuss additional payments to the healthcare workers fighting the COVID-19 at a separate meeting on Monday.

According to Mishustin, additional payments to the doctors in hospitals with COVID-19 patients will amount to 60,000 rubles monthly from April 15 until July 15. Payments to the nurses and social workers will range between 20,000 rubles and 35,000 rubles.

Mishustin also said that fulfillment of liabilities to healthcare workers is an absolute priority. "Control over how payments to healthcare personnel are made in regions is constant and at the highest level," he said.

He said that on May 16, the government signed a more than 22 billion ruble tranche for payments to healthcare workers for May.

The government also approved a list of diseases the development or aggravation of which amid the coronavirus pandemic will allow healthcare workers to receive a one-time insurance payment of over 68,000 rubles, Mishustin said. Such payments will be significantly higher in case of disability or death, he added.

Deputy Healthcare Minister Tatyana Semyonova told Rossiya 1 television channel that almost 123,000 healthcare workers in Russia had received stimulating payments for work with patients with COVID-19.

First two tranches of the total sum of 41.7 billion rubles reserved for these payments have already been allocated, she added.

(73.2056 rubles – U.S. $1)

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