Nursing: It’s not women’s work

Even after the pandemic showed nursing’s critical value to the country, the profession is still undervalued as unskilled “women’s work”. How can we fix gender inequality in nursing? Is nursing paid so poorly simply because of sexism or is the issue more complex? And should we recruit more men into the profession – or by trying to make nursing seem less “feminine”, are we tacitly accepting a sexist perspective that holds women nurses back?  Nursing Matters is presented by PNC chair Rachel Hollis with Kendal Moran, a former Army sapper who retrained and transferred to the Queen Alexandra’s Royal Army Nursing Corps. This week’s guests are nurse Leanne Patrick who tweets @FeministRCN and Rachael McIlroy, RCN Senior Research Lead. We’d love to hear your questions. Tweet them to @theRCN tagged #NursingMatters  •   “We’ve traditionally seen nursing as a moral good, not a productive good – but nursing is crucially value in economic terms.”– Rachael McIlroy •   “If we’re legitimising men’s reluctance to do a job that’s considered feminine, we’re legitimising misogyny.” – Leanne Patrick •   “The job gets bigger, but the pay packet doesn’t.” – Rachael McIlroy Presented by Rachel Hollis and Kendal Moran. Audio production by Alex Rees. Assistant producer Jelena Sofronijevic. Music: ‘Snappy’ by Jonathan Boyle under licence from premiumbeat.com. Nursing Matters is a Podmasters Production for the RCN. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices