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OPERATIONS at several hospitals across the island, which were yesterday affected after hundreds of nurses called in sick or were absent, should return to normal today following meetings between Health Minister Dr Christopher Tufton and the Nurses Association of Jamaica last evening and a "mandate" issued to the Government by disgruntled nurses.Jamaicans yesterday woke up from three days of a national lockdown to reports that nurses at several hospitals, including Cornwall Regional in St James, Mandeville Regional in Manchester, University Hospital of the West Indies in St Andrew, and St Ann's Bay had failed to show, reportedly smarting over comments made by Prime Minister Andrew Holness during a press briefing last Thursday.The prime minister, during the briefing, had been asked by a member of the media whether health workers would be put on a priority list for treatment and for ventilators. Holness, in responding, said: "Once it comes to care, the standard medical triage would apply, there wouldn't be any predetermined priority list; that would be problematic. The medical professionals would have to look case by case and triage, but it couldn't be that there is a priority list. We wouldn't give a predetermined priority list for a person to get like access to oxygen and so forth, no."Yesterday, Health Minister Dr Christopher Tufton, who said he had discussions with the executive of the NAJ and some 300 nurses on Tuesday night, said he had been taken off guard by the actions of the nurses as the prime minister's comments had been but one concern voiced by the nurses who were more concerned about salary negotiations and working conditions."I tried to address a number of issues, including questions around their working conditions, the stress of COVID, and remuneration issues. The issue of the prime minister's comment did come up, but I did not get the impression that it was as substantial an issue as being made out to be in some media spaces. I think the more significant issues are the fatigue and the issues around compensation," Dr Tufton told the Jamaica Observer yesterday.The health minister said, based on the fact that the nurses had agreed to another meeting for the Government to put solutions on the table in respect of the concerns raised, the turn of events yesterday took him by surprise."I did indicate that some of the issues that were raised were being addressed; for example, our advertisement to bring more health workers onto the staff complement so we can ease some of the burden, and we will take anybody who is competent. Secondly, the outsourcing of some of the services where we would have private entities coming on board to vaccinate, and a payment per person vaccinated, and that would take some of the stress off them and the expansion of space in certain hospitals and a couple of other things," Dr Tufton pointed out.Yesterday, the health minister said following an emergency meeting with the executive of the NAJ, "There was some clarity brought to the issues, and the executive indicated it would take that information back. I reiterated that the statement by the prime minister was misinterpreted and that he definitely cares about the health-care workers and that we have been having discussions as to how to enhance their environment.""That's the situation. I am hoping that tomorrow [today] we will see the nurses returning," he stated.In the meantime, Tufton said, "The administrative and clinical leadership at each institution worked to find ways to overcome those issues, so we tried to maintain normality as best as possible."Last evening, President of the NAJ Patsy Edwards-Henry, speaking with the Observer, said the association, to some extent, had also been caught off guard by action of some members but emphasised that the return to normality by nurses was on condition that the prime minister not so much apologise, but make a statement to the nurses to reverse the distress brought on by his comments."We had discussions about the challenges the nurses are facing, what led to the nurses going off, and what needs to be done to have the nurses report to work tomorrow [today]. The nurses, in a meeting this morning, indicated that their main challenge was the utterances of the prime minister as it relates to priority care and the fact that everybody would have to go through the triage system."We have been going, going, going; the nurses are tired, the nurses are fatigued, there is a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE), there is a shortage of resources, work conditions are poor, and nurses just came to a boiling point and a group of young nurses, in their exuberance, took it up and decided to go off," she explained.She said the association was not contacted initially, but said officials had got wind of the plans and tried to stop it to no avail.In the meantime, she said Jamaica's nurses, who are the third-lowest paid in the Caribbean, and have been so for years, are not prepared to accept platitudes.However, the NAJ president said that following discussions with the health minister, "We have had dialogue with our nurses, and are asking them to return to work. We know the ministry will not have full disclosure and full dialogue with us until nurses have gone back to work so we have asked nurses to go back to work," she told the Observer.