I don't believe it is a nerf so much as actively taking skills in with you that you know you'll need. If a dungeon has nothing that will inflict statuses that can be removed, there's no reason for esuna to take up space on your hotbar. If you know a boss doesn't physically attack much, there's no reason to bring eye for an eye. I see this an an incentive to actually pre-plan and will help set the difference between an active healer than healers that just heal or just DPS, but don't remove effects. At lower levels, scholars and some other active healers already protect, then swap it out for cleric stance.