The California Nurses Association and its parent group National Nurses United are holding a national day of action Wednesday, including Bay Area rallies to protest the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s suggested containment measures for the coronavirus.
The California Nurses Association accused the CDC of weakening containment protocols like rolling back protective equipment standards from N95 masks to regular surgical masks, not requiring virus patients to be quarantined and loosening protections for nurses taking respiratory samples from patients.
The CDC issued new guidelines Tuesday that said “facemasks are an acceptable alternative when the supply chain of respirators cannot meet the demand.”
The CNA and NNU will hold rallies at Oakland’s Alta Bates Summit Medical Center Summit Campus, Martinez’s Contra Costa County Medical Center, the Kaiser Permanente Vallejo hospital and call center and Hayward’s
St. Rose Hospital, as well as a news conference at the main UC San Francisco Parnassus campus.
“If nurses and health care workers aren’t protected, that means patients and the public are not protected,” CNA and NNU executive director Bonnie Castillo said. “This is a major public health crisis of unknown
proportions.”
Nurses in California are protected by the state’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health’s standards for airborne transmissible diseases, according to the CNA.
Nurses in other states, however, do not receive the same support. Union officials said it’s important for states with high disease protection standards to maintain them as the coronavirus outbreak worsens.
“Now is not the time to be weakening our standards and protections, or cutting corners,” Castillo said. “Now is the time we should be stepping up our efforts.”
18 comments
Silly nurses.
Don’t they know that N95 masks are not an effective tool in limiting transmission of SARS-CoV-2?
Mayor, is this sarcasm font showing?
This is how it starts.
Or how it ends. I’ve decided to continue with business are usual with some common sense steps to mitigate risk. But damned if I’m hiding. Bet my German class is empty tonight. Instructor will be there though, she’s a hard core Frau from the old school.
#destroyallrobots
Atticus
I am glad you posted this, Saves me the time.
Learning German has been a challenge for me.
Viel Gluck
There is a public school in San Diego my grand kids go to that teaches one week in English one week in German. Both my grand kids speak German like a native Germans. I just got a notice from my daughter in law that a German program they put on every year will be on line this year so we will be able to watch it this year.
That’s wonderful Ricardoh, your grandchildren already have ,a cognitive advantage over their peers. Heck, maybe go for a third language before their brain hardens. They’d be set. Russian maybe. That might come in handy in their lifetime. 🐻
Vielen Dank lovelace!
#destroyallrobots
So… they are holding rallies… gathering in large groups at rallies, to protest sloppy containment measures?
Correct
It all depends on your definition of ‘expendable equipment’. Shouldn’t doctors be the first to ‘go down with the ship’?
Frankly, I think containment measures are a joke. We are already seeing transmission to people with no known risk of exposure, so this thing is most-likely going to plow through our population. Perhaps it might have been different if China had been open and honest from the outset.
Great observation.
And stop coming to the ER for silly complaints. Go to your primary MD! 75% of what you call emergencies are not.
If you’ll post your work schedule, we’ll try to just walk it off, at least until the next shift takes over.
You obviously are unfamiliar with the term “burn out,” TraumaRx
The only viruses that are ever contained are those that kill quickly. The Coronavirus does not and containment did not and will not happen. The best we can hope for is that it can be slowed to the point where the Hospitals don’t become overwhelmed with those people that have a severe reaction to the virus. If that happens then a lot of people that need advanced care and life support will not get it and the kill rate will go high. Hope it doesn’t play out that way but I think it will. I do hope that the health care workers and first responders do get a level pf ppe that will protect them. We should have been better prepared for this since pandemics have been around forever. Moving all of the pharmaceutical companies and medical supply companies to China is not going to play in our favor in the coming weeks either. They’ve got us by the snarglies if they decide to play hardball with medications and supplies.
We’re in a pandemic of fear. The virus isn’t as big of a deal as everyone perceives it to be. Seriously people, all you have to do is wash your hands. It’s not that difficult.
https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-ten-reasons-why-you-ought-not-to-panic-132941
Bob Wiley, excellent article !
What FDR said: “We have nothing to fear but fear itself”.
With American bureaucracy and costs, how long would it take to build a hospital the size of Walnut Creek like the Chinese did? Think Bay Bridge.
As an ER RN that is bored out of her mind on Covid quarantine because my hospital didn’t have enough N-95 masks, I would love to remind people to STOP BUYING ALL THE MASKS AND LEAVE THEM FOR US. Please. Also, DO NOT come to the ER to “get tested” unless you’ve had exposure to someone sick and are having shortness of breath, intractable fever or some other life-threatening issue. Otherwise, stay home, wash your hands, and wait for it to pass.
Too many people are considering the sniffles “emergencies” these days and it is crippling our healthcare system and depleting our resources. One example comes to mind: ME. I should be caring for sick patients, not confined to my bedroom because I didn’t have adequate PPE. Sack up, y’all.
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