National Nurses United today charged that decades of unwarranted hospital industry safety cuts have led to many of the current staffing and capacity crises, and that demands for rolling back workplace public safety rules would only exacerbate the severity of the pandemic.

Registered nurses will hold a press conference Wednesday, Dec. 2 at Antelope Valley Hospital in Lancaster, Calif. to declare their opposition to the hospital’s application for a waiver of state-mandated nurse-to-patient staffing ratios, which was approved by the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) on Monday, Nov. 30

Registered nurses at Keck Hospital of USC and USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center in Los Angeles will hold an informational picket and car caravan honk-a-thon on Dec. 2 to protest unsafe working conditions and policy changes that jeopardize the health of patients and violate health care workers’ contracts and state law.

Nurses scored a tremendous victory for the type of infection control measures they have been demanding since the start of the pandemic when the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) on Wednesday directed all general acute-care hospitals in the state to begin Covid-19 weekly testing of all health care workers on Dec. 14 and of all patient admissions starting now.

Registered nurses will hold a press conference Tuesday, Dec. 1 to protest the planned closure of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at Sutter Delta Medical Center in Antioch, Calif. The hospital plans to shutter the unit by the end of December.

At a virtual press conference held Monday, Nov. 23 to brief the nation on the challenges they face now as Covid-19 surges in almost every state, National Nurses United RNs impassionately urged their employers, government, and the public to “Listen to nurses” and follow the science of infection control that the country needs to mitigate the catastrophic death and suffering they are anticipating heading into the winter and holiday seasons.

Registered nurses at University of California, Los Angeles will hold a vigil on Monday, Nov. 23 to alert the public to their patient safety concerns as hospitalizations spike in the county.

National Nurses United will hold a virtual press conference Monday, Nov. 23 to brief the nation on the challenges nurses face now as Covid-19 infection rates, hospitalizations, and deaths surge to record-breaking highs in almost every state.

Registered nurses at the Rocky Mountain Regional VA Medical Center in Aurora, Colorado will hold a rally Friday, Nov. 20 to alert the public about patient safety issues as a result of chronic short staffing, to denounce hospital management’s decision to implement widespread shift changes, and to employ overt intimidation tactics as an attempt to deny the nurses their collective bargaining rights.

Global Nurses United (GNU), a federation of the world’s premiere nurse and health care worker unions, today sent a letter to the World Health Organization (WHO), demanding that the WHO strengthen its guidance on Covid-19.