When the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington ruled Friday to overturn President Obama's recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board, it handed a huge gift to Wall Street, big corporations and the politicians they control. —San Francisco Chronicle, 01/28/13 More »
Business reporter Alana Semuels talks with nurses union organizer David Johnson and UC Berkeley Prof. Harley Shaiken about why labor unions are growing in California but not the nation. —Los Angeles Times, 01/24/13 More »
America is dangerous to your health. A recent international commission reported that U.S. men rank last in life expectancy for the 17 industrial nations in the study; U.S. women rank next to last. When it comes to health, the United States is exceptional — exceptionally bad. —The Washington Post, 01/16/13 More »
Columnist Colleen O'Connor explains why Rose Ann DeMoro, the director of the nurses union, is more powerful than any woman in California but the governor's wife. A month into the new year and it is obvious who the 2013 Person of the Year in California will be: Rose Ann DeMoro. —PowayPatch.com, 01/16/13 More »
Chicago, IL – More than two hundred union leaders and activists gathered in Chicago for the Labor Campaign's fourth national conference to strategize about next steps for labor in the movement to win universal health care. With government officials from both major parties contemplating cuts in Medicare as part of a "grand bargain," delegates resolved to stand up to any cuts in this cornerstone social insurance program. —Labor Campaign for Single Payer Health Care , 01/14/13 More »
BROCKTON -- Nurses union leaders are hopeful they will see changes at the Brockton Multi-Service Center after sitting down with the state’s mental health commissioner. —EnterpriseNews.com, 01/14/13 More »
In a California Healthline Special Report by Kenny Goldberg, experts discussed whether hospital workers should be required to obtain vaccines for influenza. Hear what Zenei Cortez, co-president of the California Nurses Association has to say in this audio interview. —California Healthline, 01/14/13 More »
THIEF RIVER FALLS, Minn. — A group of northern Minnesota nurses will rally in Thief River Falls on Friday in support of a legislative proposal that would set minimum staffing levels at hospitals across the state. —Minnesota Public Radio, 01/10/13 More »
America may be one of the richest countries in the world, but its people are less healthy and more likely to die early from disease or accidents than those in any other affluent country, a damning official US report has found —The Guardian, 01/10/13 More »
When you decide not to get a flu shot, the risk is that you or someone near you will get sick. But for health care workers, the price is increasingly a pink slip. Hundreds have already been fired. —USA Today, 01/10/13 More »
AUSTALIA--The NSW Nurses Association has said it will campaign for mandatory staffing ratios in more areas of the health system when the NSW nurses industrial award expires in June. —Newcastle Herald, 01/10/13 More »
Three trillion dollars a year. That's how much the wealthiest Americans avoid through the system of subsidies and schemes and sweet deals that deprive middle-class workers of their earned benefits. That's three times more than the deficit. That's enough for a full-time job for every middle-class household in America. —Common Dreams, 01/09/13 More »
Nurses at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in San Rafael, and 20 other Kaiser hospitals from Santa Rosa to Fresno, picketed Wednesday to protest what they say is "persistently inadequate nurse staffing." The action mounted by the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United comes as Kaiser is attempting to cut its nurse staffing. —Marin Independent Journal, 12/20/12 More »
Why is the President back to making premature and unnecessary concessions to Republicans? Two central issues in the 2012 presidential election were whether the Bush tax cuts should be ended for people earning over $250,000, and whether Social Security and Medicare should be protected from future budget cuts. —Robert Reich's Blog, 12/20/12 More »
Our nurses see dire need every day in the ER, but the growing gulf of inequality in the US has made such deprivation ubiquitous. With a compromise on social security now unmasked – costing the elderly an estimated 6.2-7.7%, according to business writer Doug Henwood – America becomes more and more a place of poverty. Warnings that austerity begets poverty will go ignored, but the nation's deteriorating condition cannot so easily be overlooked. —The Guardian, 12/19/12 More »
Tomorrow is Worlds Aids Day. And those working on HIV/AIDS have an amazing story to tell the world: we can end the AIDS crisis. Breakthroughs in science have shown us that getting AIDS drugs to those with HIV not only keeps them alive and healthy, but can reduce risk of infection by 96%. This news is amazing - from now on, no one needs to die of AIDS - no one needs to become HIV positive. —Robin Hood Tax UK, 11/30/12 More »
It wasn't even close. That's the unexpected result of the November 6 election. And President Obama and his supporters must wrap their heads around this new reality -- just as their Republican rivals are going to have to adjust to it. After a very long, very hard campaign that began the night of the 2010 “Republican wave” election, a campaign defined by unprecedented spending and take-no-prisoners debate strategies, Barack Obama was reelected president. And he did so with an ease that allowed him to claim what even his supporters dared not imagine until a little after 11 p.m. on the night of his last election: a credible, national win. —The Nation, 11/07/12 More »
St. Johns Health Center registered nurses on Friday and Saturday ratified their first ever collective bargaining agreement in a secret ballot, according to the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United. —Santa Monica Mirror, 10/31/12 More »
Mention nurses in the Bay Area these days and two images come to mind: a caring, nurturing professional at a patient's bedside, and a perturbed, bullhorn carrying protester walking a picket line. By one estimate, the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United has called more than 70 strikes at the state's hospitals in the past two years. Its members will walk off the job again Thursday, waging a one-day strike against seven East Bay hospitals affiliated with Sutter Health as part of an 18-month-long attempt to negotiate a new contract. —Silicon Valley Mercury News, 10/31/12 More »
As a Bakersfield nurse who has dedicated the past 29 years to serving my community, I am deeply alarmed at the danger posed to my patients, my neighbors and my family by Proposition 32. Sponsors of Prop. 32 hope the misleading ads that fill our screens daily will persuade you this measure will restrict corporations and unions from influencing elections. Nothing could be further from the truth. —The Bakersfield Californian, 10/25/12 More »
