Philip Pramer, Gabriele Scherndl and Elisa Tomaselli created a multimedia-project on 24-hour nurses from Eastern Europe as part of the project “OIDA”.
Tens of thousands of women take thousands of miles each month to look after people in Austria – often in adverse circumstances. Many of them are exposed to a system of dependency and exploitation. Philip Pramer, Gabriele Scherndl and Elisa Tomaselli looked at the system from the inside: They drove with the taxi, which nurses have to use to get to Austria, to Romania and accompanied Elena Popa, a nurse who was sued by her agency, in front of court. The story convinced the jury of the Prälat Leopold Ungar Journalism Prize: The jury honored the story on November 5, 2018 in the category “Print”. For the 15th time, the Prälat Leopold Ungar Journalism Prize honored journalists for their outstanding work on topics such as poverty, care, escape, integration, illness or discrimination and for promoting tolerance and understanding for people on the margins of society.
The story “Elena and her silent army”, which later appeared in the weekend edition of the newspaper “Der Standard”, was originally created as part of the FHWien der WKW project “OIDA”. Nearly 40 students from the Master’s program designed the multimedia project, which deals with the life-reality of older people, their worries, problems, dreams and hopes. The texts, videos and audio files are available at www.oida.online.