Nursing strike at two big NYC hospitals ends after three days

A nursing strike that disrupted patient care at two of New York City's largest hospitals for three days is over.

Both hospitals, Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx and Mount Sinai Hospital in upper Manhattan, announced early Thursday that they'd reached tentative agreements with New York State Nurses Association. The union said so, as well, a short time later. It called the accords "historic."

Both hospitals were postponing nonemergency surgeries, diverting ambulances to other medical centers, pulling in temporary staffers and assigning administrators with nursing backgrounds to work in wards in order to cope with the walkout of as many as 7,100 nurses.

The union had said it was forced into the drastic step of striking because of severe understaffing that left nurses caring for too many patients.

But it said early Thursday that nurses "won concrete enforceable safe staffing ratios in both deals and will be back on the job starting this morning."

Union President Nancy Hagans, herself a registered nurse, said in a statement that, "This is a historic victory for New York City nurses and for nurses across the country. NYSNA nurses have done the impossible, saving lives night and day, throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, and now we've again shown that nothing is impossible for nurse heroes. Through our unity and by putting it all on the line, we won enforceable safe staffing ratios at both Montefiore and Mount Sinai where nurses went on strike for patient care."

Montefiore and Mount Sinai were the last of a group of hospitals with nursing contracts that expired simultaneously. The union initially warned that it would strike at all of them at the same time, but the other hospitals reached agreements as a Monday strike deadline approached. All include raises of 7%, 6%, and 5%, respectively, over the next three years.

Montefiore said its deal calls for similar raises.

Nurses on the picket lines stressed that staffing levels were a bigger issue than pay. New York City's nurses were hailed as heroes in the spring of 2020 when the city was an epicenter of deaths from COVID-19. But they've been saying they were being burned out by poor staffing levels that have been a problem for years.

"Remember, even prior to (the) pandemic we're already short of staff," said Mount Sinai nurse Nagie Pamphil.

Montefiore said early Thursday it had agreed to add more than 170 nurses.

Mount Sinai's administration has said the union's focus on nurse-to-patient ratios "ignores the progress we have made to attract and hire more new nurses, despite a global shortage of healthcare workers that is impacting hospitals across the country."