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(Photo from CNA/NNOC Webpage)
Over the past few months there has been a growing controversy among Health Care Workers regarding the pandemic safety measures being taken by the facilities where they work.
In June the CDC’s MMWR (Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report) (Volume 58, No. 23) reported hospitals weren’t doing enough to identify potential influenza cases, to isolate them, and to protect their staff (see HCPs At Risk)
Last July the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC) filed a complaint against one hospital, which I reported on in California Nurses Association Statement On Lack Of PPE and Report: Nurses File Complaint Over Lack Of PPE.
In August I reported on Nurses Protest Lack Of PPE’s in San Francisco.
Today, we learn that a major strike/protest of nurses working at 39 hospitals in California is planned for October 30th.
Here (hat tip Crof at Crofsblog) is the press release from the CNA/NNAOC.
Major Nurses Strike and Picket Looms October 30 As RNs to Protest Hospital Gaps in Swine Flu Safety
16,000 RNs at 39 Facilities in California and Nevada
As many as 16,000 registered nurses from three large Catholic hospital chains in California and Nevada will join a one-day strike and picket October 30, as RNs step up the protest over poor readiness by many hospitals to confront the H1N1 swine flu pandemic, the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC) announced today.
The strike will affect hospitals across California from San Bernardino and Long Beach in the south to Eureka and Redding in the north, and include major facilities in Los Angeles, Sacramento, San Francisco, San Jose, Bakersfield, Stockton, and the Central Coast. Additionally, nurses will picket major facilities in Las Vegas and Reno, Nevada.
Protecting nurses, patients and families in the center of the pandemic storm
Central to the nurses' walkout is ongoing concern over the failure of the hospital chains to assure adequate safety precautions for patients, their families, nurses, and other healthcare employees in the wake of the escalating H1N1 “swine flu” pandemic.
In particular, the RNs say, many hospitals continue to do a poor job at isolating patients with H1N1 symptoms and other steps to limit contagion, or provide sufficient fit-tested N95 respirators and other protective gear for healthcare workers and patients.
Updated Centers for Disease Control recommendations released last week re-affirmed guidelines for isolation and safety equipment, and urged hospitals to avoid policies that encourage employees to work when sick, another problem in many hospitals.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration said last week that it plans to issue a compliance directive to ensure uniform procedures "to identify and minimize or eliminate high to very high risk occupational exposures" to H1N1.
CNA/NNOC wants hospitals to formally adopt all CDC and Cal-OSHA guidelines to make them enforceable by CNA/NNOC contract provisions assuring the highest safety measures are met, are uniform, and consistently applied throughout the systems.
For months, RNs have repeatedly voiced alarm at inadequate H1N1 hospital safeguards. In August, CNA/NNOC released the findings of a survey of 190 U.S. hospitals where RNs cited widespread problems with poor segregation of patients, lack of sufficient N95 masks, numerous hospitals where nurses have been infected, inadequate training for hospital staff, and punitive sick leave policies.
But substantial problems remain. In California alone, more than 3,000 people have been hospitalized, and over 200 have died, including an RN infected on the job at one of the hospitals where RNs will strike.
