Health and Safety
NNU invited to join CDC’s HICPAC workgroup on infection prevention
NNU is proud to announce that Jane Thomason, its lead industrial hygienist has been invited to join the workgroup of the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Also, Lisa Baum, lead occupational safety and health representative at NNU affiliate New York State Nurses Association, has been invited to join HICPAC.
NNU Infectious Diseases Survey final results
In March and April of 2024, NNU conducted a nationwide survey of registered nurses regarding infection prevention practices related to a range of infectious diseases.
Updates on the CDC Advisory Committee’s efforts to weaken infection control guidance for health care
See the latest on the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's work to update foundational infection control guidance for health care settings. CDC has tasked its advisory committee on health care infection control (known as HICPAC) with making these updates.
Our campaigns
RN-to-Patient Staffing Ratios
Registered nurses across the United States understand the need to set a minimum number of nurses to safely care for a given number of patients, with adjustments to increase nurse staffing based on patient acuity.
Workplace Violence Prevention
Violence against nurses and other health care workers in hospitals and other health care facilities is a growing epidemic across the United States. Learn more about NNU's national campaign to prevent workplace violence.
Patient Handling
Sprains, strains, and tears, make up 52% of all injuries that result in days away from work for RNs. Unsafe patient handling causes the bulk of these injuries, some of which have ended nurses’ careers. The solution? A safe patient handling program that includes appropriate equipment, education, and training.
Infectious Disease
NNU advocates for nurses to have the education, training, and personal protective equipment they need for infectious disease exposure control, including for known pathogens as well as preparation for emerging infectious diseases events such as the Covid-19 pandemic.
Latest resources
Take action: Sign our petition to OSHA
Sign our petition to urge OSHA to craft a national infectious diseases survey to protect health care workers and patients in every state! Join us in calling for the protections that nurses, other health care workers, and patients need to be safe from infectious diseases!
Preventing Workplace Violence to Protect Nurses and Our Patients
This CE class will examine workplace violence and how it arises in health care settings and investigate prevention measures. We will discuss the strategies that nurses can employ to prevent workplace violence and to advocate for safer patient care in their facilities.
Measles: What nurses need to know
Globally, measles cases rose 30-fold in 2023 compared to 2022. Despite its elimination in the United States in 2000, there remains a serious risk of outbreaks. Learn about protections nurses and other health care workers need to care for a patient with suspected or confirmed measles.
Avian Influenza: What nurses need to know
A highly pathogenic strain of bird flu has spread globally, causing unprecedented outbreaks in wild birds, poultry, and mammals. Multiple measures are urgently needed to control the spread of this virus.
Nurse Advocacy Network
The NNU Nurse Advocacy Network is a community of activists who are ready to mobilize to ensure that nurses and other front line health care workers have the protections and safety standards they need to care for patients.
Research and reports
High and rising rates of workplace violence and employer failure to implement effective prevention strategies is contributing to the staffing crisis
This report analyzes new data, gathered in 2023 by National Nurses United regarding nurses’ recent experiences of workplace violence.
Protecting Our Front Line: Ending the Shortage of Good Nursing Jobs and the Industry-created Unsafe Staffing Crisis
In this report, National Nurses United describes how the hospital industry has driven registered nurses from the profession and proposes steps that must taken to keep RNs at the bedside and improve patient care in U.S. hospitals.
Workplace Violence and Covid-19 in Health Care: How the Hospital Industry Created an Occupational Syndemic
This report details stark evidence of how the dual failures of health care employers to protect nurses and patients from Covid-19 and workplace violence synergistically interact to amplify the harms caused by each individually.
Deadly Shame: Redressing the Devaluation of Registered Nurse Labor Through Pandemic Equity
This report provides an in-depth analysis of the devaluation of nurses’ care work and resulting inequities, their experiences on the pandemic’s front lines, and ways to redress these issues through collective action.
Press releases
Union nurse speaks out at U.S. Senate field hearing on the dangers of corporate greed in health care
