Polish protesters warn that health care crisis is looming

Doctors, nurses and other health care workers in Poland have been camping out in front of the prime minister’s offices for nearly two weeks to protest working conditions and demand higher wages

WARSAW, Poland -- When a priest arrives at a hospital in Chorzow to perform the last rites, nurse Mariusz Strug can see the fear in dying patients' eyes. “After the sacrament, they knew what was happening,” he said.

But there have been no psychologists available to offer any consolation to the patients. Strug and another nurse would try to offer some kind words, but they were strained to the limit caring for 60 patients in their COVID-19 ward.

“People come to us and they want us nurses to perform a miracle," said Strug.

Exhausted from working in such an understaffed system, he is among a group of health care workers who have come to Warsaw from across Poland for an around-the-clock protest outside the prime minister’s office that has gone on for nearly two weeks.