Massachusetts Nurses Association Issues Statement of Support For 2,600 Kaiser Permanente Mental Health Clinicians and 700 Medical Social Workers, Optical Workers and other Healthcare Professionals and their Historic Seven-Day Strike for Safer Patient Care
The poor patient care and the lack of commitment by a highly profitable health care system that is driving this strike is symptomatic of a national mental health crisis impacting patients, families and caregivers from coast to coast
CANTON, Mass., Jan. 16, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Massachusetts Nurses Association is proud to issue this statement of support for the 2,600 Kaiser Permanente California mental health clinicians and the 700 medical social workers, optical workers and other healthcare professionals represented by the National Union of Healthcare Workers, who are in the midst of a historic seven-day strike to protest its employer's chronic failure to provide its patients safe, timely health care while reaping billions in profits.
"The strike in California has great resonance for the 23,000 nurses and allied health professionals represented by the Massachusetts Nurses Association, as the issues driving this strike are the same issues our members face every day as we struggle to deal with what can only be described as a national crisis in the care of the mentally ill in America," said MNA President Donna Kelley-Williams, RN. "We applaud these caregivers for their willingness to put their own livelihoods on the line for those in our society who are being neglected due to corporate greed and our society's failure to provide parity in the funding, care and treatment for those with behavioral health issues."
In addition to issuing a statement of support, the MNA has also made a donation of $5,000 to the clinician's strike fund.
Founded in 1903, the Massachusetts Nurses Association/National Nurses United is the largest professional health care organization and the largest union of registered nurses in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Its 23,000 members advance the nursing profession by fostering high standards of nursing practice, promoting the economic and general welfare of nurses in the workplace, projecting a positive and realistic view of nursing, and by lobbying the Legislature and regulatory agencies on health care issues affecting nurses and the public. The MNA is a founding member of National Nurses United, the largest national nurses' union in the United States with more than 170,000 members from coast to coast.
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SOURCE Massachusetts Nurses Association/National Nurses United
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