Limoges: CAF agents from the Caisse d’Allocation Familliale give leave for medical research and the Red Cross
94 days of free leave, which amounts to 24,000 euros. This is what 65 agents of the Limoges family allowance fund collected during confinement. Two checks for 12,000 euros were handed over to the Red Cross and Inserm on Thursday.
It all started during confinement. The 180 employees of the Caisse d’Allocation Familliale fund received an email from management (the idea had been suggested by employees) asking them if they would be in favor of donating days off to people mobilized on the front line during the Covid-19 epidemic. Then, several other emails, offering them to choose who they wanted to give. The Red Cross, for its support to the most vulnerable, and Inserm, to encourage its research on the virus.
“We rather had the idea of donating to a research association,” explains Virginie Queraud, who donated two days of RTT. “We saw that there were already donations for caregivers, bonuses, and above all, that it was not a request on their part.” “We thought that in the budget of a university hospital, 24,000 euros would be a drop in the bucket,” continues CAF deputy director Sébastien Blanchard. “We therefore decided to stay in more modest structures, in the directions that the employees had given us”.
A giant check in hand, like a lottery winner, Laurent Delpy, research director at CNRS and representative of Inserm, is moved by this gesture. He thought it was a donation from CAF, and not from its employees. “We don’t promise to get you a vaccine, but we will try. »He laughs with the employees. “It is quite exceptional! »He emphasizes.
With these 12,000 euros, a rare donation for Inserm, he will “buy reagents to work in the laboratory to mimic the infection by the virus and try to develop antibodies“. But he has already said he will come back and explain to the workers what he has done with the money from their days off.
