Nurses Strike At Sutter Health Facilities Across Northern California
SAN FRANCISCO (BCN/CBS SF) -- More than 8,000 nurses and health care workers are striking today outside 18 Sutter Health facilities across Northern California, including a dozen in the Bay Area.
Union representatives say Sutter Health has refused to address concerns about safe staffing and health and safety protections.
The one-day strike was authorized by a nearly unanimous vote in March and advance notice was given to Sutter Health for the strike, according to the California Nurses Association and the Caregivers and Healthcare Employees Union.
The nurses and health care workers have been in negotiations since June 2021 for a new contract, with little to no movement on key issues, according to a statement from the union.
The nurses are calling on management to invest in nursing staff and agree to a contract that provides safe staffing that allows nurses to provide safe and therapeutic care. The nurses and health care workers also want the hospitals to invest in personal protective equipment stockpiles and comply with California's PPE stockpile law.
"We are striking because Sutter is not transparent about the stockpile of PPE supplies and contact tracing," said Renee Waters, an intensive care RN with 26 years of experience. "They resist having nurses directly involved in planning and implementation of policies that affect all of us during a pandemic."
The nurses were scheduled to picket from 7 to 11 a.m. and 2 to 6 p.m. on Monday at Sutter Health facilities in cities that include Berkeley, Oakland, Vallejo, Santa Rosa, San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Castro Valley, Antioch, Burlingame and Novato.
Sutter officials said contracted replacement workers would staff the facilities during the strike.
In an email to KPIX 5 a Sutter Health spokesperson said, "By moving forward with today's costly and disruptive strike, union leadership has made it clear they are willing to put politics above patients and the nurses they represent – despite the intervention of federal mediators and our willingness to bargain in good faith while under threat of a strike. Our attention is on providing safe, high-quality care to the patients and communities we're honored to serve. We are confident in our ability to manage this disruption. We are hopeful CNA shares our desire to reach an agreement and enable our nurses to turn their focus back to the patients the union has asked them to walk away from."
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