The government is paying young doctors extra wages to draw patients’ blood and counter months-long union directives that are being followed by phlebotomists, Times of Malta has learnt. The phlebotomists are obeying directives issued by the Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses in a dispute over a sectoral agreement due to replace the one that expired in January last year. Sources close to the hospital said the doctors were receiving remuneration to draw blood instead of the phlebotomists, in an effort to reduce the hardships caused to patients. Phlebotomists have been ordered to limit the number of patients they see every day and to stop outsourcing work or tackling waiting lists. This is having an adverse effect on patients who go to Mater Dei hospital to have blood drawn, the sources said. Sometimes, patients turn up for a hospital appointment only to be sent back home. One patient said she had been waiting for an hour only for her and 14 other patients, including some elderly, to be informed the quota of the day had been reached and they should go home. Another, in a letter to Times of Malta wrote: "What's going on right now at the phlebotomy department at Mater Dei is...