2,000 Nurses Go On Strike at Long Beach Memorial Medical Center

Photo by Amy the Nurse via Flickr

City News Service reports that the group of nurses, who are part of the California Nurses
Association/National Nurses United, haven't had a contract for months, in part because they say that their employer is trying to jack up the amount that they pay for health insurance when the rate that the hospital pays isn't going up at all. They're also concerned with patient-to-nurse rations, and patient lift policies that they're afraid put patients and nurses at risk for injury.

In response to the strike, the hospital hired temporary nurses. The strike was only supposed to be for 24 hours, but the temps were hired for five days, hence the refusal to allow the striking nurses back in until next Tuesday.

The nurses on strike won't get paid while they're not at work.