The extraordinary commissioner of the Great Metropolitan Hospital of Reggio Calabria Gianluigi Scaffidi«in light of the serious and repeated episodes of aggression against hospital staff that occurred at the Gom» wrote to the prefect of Reggio Clara Vaccaro “in order to act as a spokesperson to the Government for a request for legislative intervention to resolve the situation”. This was announced by the Reggio Emilia Hospital Trust.
The letter from Scaffidi, who has already intervened on the issue several times, was sent today and is motivated, as written in a note, «also by the firm belief that the‘the current legal system does not sufficiently protect healthcare workers throughout Italy, who, feeling their safety threatened in the workplace, cannot carry out the very delicate tasks to which they are called, with the necessary tranquility. We also remember, if there should be any need, that the role of the health worker is crucial for our society”.
Therefore, on the one hand, «in the absolute awareness of the impossibility of rapidly increasing the presence of law enforcement in hospitals, and on the other, that private security cannot carry out comparable tasks, not having, among other things, the prerogatives of the Law», it is the opinion of the extraordinary commissioner of the Gom and of the entire strategic management, «that the time is ripe for a decisive intervention on the merits in legislative terms».
«In light of the above – Scaffidi wrote in the letter – the prefect is invited to forward to the Government the request for legislative modification, through emergency decree, of art. 583 quater of the Penal Code, with provision for arrest in flagrante delicto or, alternatively, to introduce into the Penal Code, always through an emergency decree, an autonomous title for the crime of ‘assault on hospital staff’ with provision for deferred arrest in flagrante delicto, without prejudice to the possibility of ex officio prosecution”.