“Hate has no Place in Healthcare!”
Nurses & healthcare workers decry cruel Federal rule that would
jeopardize patient safety for women, LGBTQI patients, and others
(San Francisco, CA) This morning, nurses, healthcare workers, and community allies spoke out to oppose a final rule change by the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). This rule change would destroy healthcare workers’ “duty to care” by allowing religious objections to care that will impact LGBTQI patients, women’s healthcare, and more.
A letter of support from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is available here.
Members of the Service Employees International Union Local 1021, Committee of Interns and Residents (SEIU), SEIU Nurse Alliance of California, faith leaders including Rev. Claire Bohman and Fresh “Lev” White, and Chief of Staff Dan Bernal from Speaker Pelosi’s San Francisco office all took part in this morning’s ceremony to speak out against the Trump administration’s discriminatory rule change.
Nurses and allies then symbolically chained themselves together with a string of paper hearts to represent their unity and commitment to caring for every patient and defending access to lifesaving care.
“Just as people with HIV were demonized in the 1980s, the federal government is again encouraging the unethical and inhumane treatment of patients and justifying it as ‘religious freedom.’ But healthcare providers, especially here in San Francisco, are committed to fighting for our patients and our profession,” said SEIU 1021 member Sasha Cuttler, a Registered Nurse at San Francisco General Hospital.
“Religiously observant healthcare workers learn, as the adults we are, how to navigate our choices of work, taking into account the realities of patient needs and own beliefs. It is incumbent on us to make job decisions that would never result in our denying a patient care. It is patients who need protections and a guarantee that they will be treated with dignity, and will have access to quality care, care as excellent and thorough as the next person. These inhumane rules from a Health (and supposedly) Human Services Department allow individual healthcare workers, as well as religiously based healthcare systems, to discriminate and withhold care,” said SEIU 1021 Mary Magee, RN.
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SEIU Local 1021 represents nearly 60,000 employees in local governments, non-profit agencies, health care programs and schools throughout Northern California, including 20,000 in San Francisco. SEIU 1021 represents more than half of all workers employed by the City and County of San Francisco; registered nurses and other healthcare workers at the city’s hospitals, clinics, and jails; court workers, and nonprofit workers who provide care and support to the city’s most vulnerable populations.
Using the Cal/OSHA Workplace Violence Prevention Standard in Healthcare
Workshop offering 6 Continuing Education Units
being held on Tuesday March 24, 2020
SEIU Local 1000 office at 436 14th St. Ste. 200 Oakland, CA
10:00 – 4:30pm (lunch and light breakfast provided)
Email hughesk@seiunaca.org or Text 619-548-1811 to register
Open & free to all SEIU Local 1021 and Local 1000 nurses
Approved for 6 CEUs by BRN Provider No. 3413
SEIU Nurses and other healthcare workers led the fight for a Cal/OSHA standard to protect healthcare workers from violence
This course will cover:
– A review of workplace violence typologies and prevention. The new regulation: what it means and how to use it.
– How nurses and our union can effectively participate in developing WPV prevention programs at each worksite.
– Union strategies and action steps for enforcement & building a good case for a Cal/OSHA complaint
On October 20, the Cal/OSHA Standard Board unanimously voted to adopt the first workplace violence prevention standard for healthcare workers in California. Our hope is that this Standard will be used as a template at the national level.
In 2010, Ingela Dahlgren, RN, and Kathy Hughes, RN, attended a rally to honor the memory of Dona Gross, a psychiatric technician at Napa State Mental Hospital, who was strangled to death by a patient while at work. This atrocity was the latest in a string of violent incidents which inspired the beginnings of a workplace safety movement which continues today.
While focused effort under strong leadership underpinned this successful campaign, the true heroes in the battle for a safe work environment are all the nurses and the health care workers in this great state of California.
Sharing their personal accounts of attacks, threats, and harassment in the workplace, healthcare workers retold their stories before the Cal/OSHA Standard Board to bring attention to the urgent need for regulatory change. These heart-breaking stories propelled the Cal/OSHA Standard Board to approve improvements in their regulations governing the management and operation of healthcare facilities throughout California.
This new Cal/OSHA Standard applies to most employers of nurses, health care workers, and the communities they serve in California. With this new regulation in place, Cal/OSHA is ready to implement workplace violence prevention measures in California and soon for the rest of the U.S.
The men and women who shared their stories are to be applauded for motivating the Committee to consider the importance of this issue at a very personal level. For the last couple of years, many SEIU Locals and the California State Council have supported our campaign financially and by actively participating in our rallies and events. We are very grateful for all their support and encouragement. We want to thank you again for your participation over the years!
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In March of this year, unrelenting members of Local 721 accompanied by other professions including: Social Workers, Medical Case Workers, Surgical Technicians, Physical Therapy Aid, Licensed Vocational Nurses, Registered Nurses, and Nurse Practitioners shared with Dr. Katz, Department of Health Services for Los Angeles County, their alarming stories of overt bullying and silent retaliation at the hands of managers.
Following-through with action, Dr. Mitch Katz put management and administration on notice by circulating a memo condemning bully behavior in the workplace.
“As a testament to his commitment and genuine interest in making immediate strides in creating a bully free DHS, Dr. Katz sent out a department wide memo on May 2nd condemning bullying behavior and asking DHS employees, including management and supervisors, to join him in pledging to treat all workforce members with dignity and respect.”
And it doesn’t stop with Local 721. In June of this year, the Joint Commission published downloadable guidelines which further clarifies how “bullying” is to be defined, identified and treated separately and distinctly from illegal harassment.
SEIU Local 721 demonstrates how standing together, we remain strong in this blog post showing how MLK Outpatient Center’s CEO responded to the Dr. Katz memo by endorsing and expanding the message specifically to this facility.
“…Our primary focus should always be patients first. But, we cannot properly care for our patients if we are not respectful toward one another. I know that we can do it…” – Cynthia Oliver, CEO
