The parliament today approved an amendment to the Government decree-law that again allows diabetics and hypertensive individuals unable to perform teleworking duties to have the right to justify absences due to the covid-19 pandemic.
The final text reached by the Health Commission, originating from PSD, BE and PCP initiatives, was approved in a global final vote, with votes against by the PS and in favor of the remaining benches and two socialist deputies: Maria Antónia Almeida Santos and Ascenso Simões .
The initial decree-law of the Government, of May 1, provided that diabetics and hypertensive patients, as well as other chronically ill or immunocompromised persons, could justify the absence from work by means of a medical declaration, “as long as they cannot perform their activity in teleworking regime or through other forms of activity provision “.
However, four days later, on May 5, a rectification to the Government’s diploma was published, which started to exclude diabetics and hypertensive patients from the exceptional protection regime that allowed these and other chronically ill patients to exercise teleworking activities, or in its impossibility, the justification of absence from work by means of a medical declaration attesting “the health condition of the worker that justifies his special protection”.
Due to this rectification, PSD, BE and PCP called the Government’s diploma to parliament, in order to re-introduce diabetics and hypertensive patients into this regime.
Earlier this month, the Portuguese Diabetic Protective Association (APDP) reiterated the call to the Government to reconsider the exclusion of these chronically ill patients from the teleworking scheme, recalling the increased risk of diabetics against covid-19, an infectious respiratory disease.
Portugal accounts for at least 1,549 deaths associated with covid-19 in 40,415 confirmed cases of infection, according to the latest bulletin from the Directorate-General for Health (DGS).
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