It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Friday, April 03, 2020
Whole Foods Workers Protest, Company Sees 'No Operational Impact'
Whole Foods employees are looking for increased hazard pay among other demands including guaranteed paid leave for workers who self-quarantine.
That appeared to be an accurate assessment after spot checks at the Whole Foods stores in Gowanus and Fort Greene, Brooklyn showed business as usual with some employees telling TheStreet they had no idea there was strike planned for today.
The plan, according to Whole Worker, a national network of Whole Foods employees that organized the sick out, is to pressure Whole Foods into increasing hazard pay, among other demands.
"The most obvious demand we have is for an increase in hazard pay. We’re asking for double pay,” Vice quoted an anonymous Chicago Whole Foods employee, and strike organizer as saying.
Attempts to reach Whole Foods were not successful, but the company did put out a statement to the Daily Mail saying
'It is disappointing that a small but vocal group, many of whom are not employed by Whole Foods Market, have been given a platform to inaccurately portray the collective voice of our 95,000+ Team Members who are heroically showing up every day to provide our communities with an essential service.'
The company also said that the sick out had "no operational impact."
A few weeks ago, Whole Foods raised hourly pay for its workers by $2 an hour and offered to provide two weeks of paid sick leave to workers, but that doesn't go far enough for disgruntled workers who want that pay increase to become permanent. according to a telegram post from a Whole Foods employee.
The elephant in the room is Whole Foods behemoth of a parent company, Amazon (AMZN) - Get Report.
Historically, Amazon has been more risk-averse when it comes to labor and labor disputes. And while Amazon is one of the country's biggest employers with over 400,000 employees in the U.S. alone, its trajectory is pointed toward reducing labor costs over the long term.
The company is also developing robotic warehouse technology that could eventually endanger Amazon's 125,000 full-time fulfillment center employees
As coronavirus cases pop up at warehouses and supermarkets, workers have begun demanding better pay, sick leave and on-the-job protections from the deadly respiratory virus.
(Bloomberg)—Amazon.com Inc., Instacart Inc. and other companies providing food, medicine and other essentials are about to find out whether the pandemic can accomplish what organized labor has struggled to do: give employees and contractors the leverage to extract better working conditions.
Some employees at Amazon’s Staten Island, New York, warehouse walked off the job on Monday, calling for the company to shut the facility for extended cleaning after they say a number of their colleagues were diagnosed with COVID-19. Instacart workers called for a nationwide strike on Monday over safety and pay concerns. And, if a petition circulating online gets traction, workers at Amazon-owned Whole Foods Market plan to call in sick en masse on Tuesday.
As the coronavirus cases pop up at warehouses and supermarkets, workers—cheered on by politicians and labor activists—have begun demanding better pay, sick leave and on-the-job protections from the deadly respiratory virus. Amazon, the second-largest private employer in the U.S., has long been the target of efforts to organize its workforce. They have generally failed.
“These things do sometimes take on a life of their own, and I wonder if we’re in one of those moments where workers are starting to stand up in greater and greater numbers because of the magnitude of the threat they’re facing,” said Brishen Rogers, an associate law professor at Temple University.
Organizers face long odds should they pursue formal unionization. Forming unions in the U.S. is difficult, and the coronavirus has both flooded the market with potential new hires and made large labor rallies impractical. Organizers of the Staten Island walkout say more than 60 employees participated; video from a protest appeared to show a sparser crowd.
“You could come out of this seeing much greater levels of worker organization within Whole Foods and Amazon that could in the future grow into formal unions,” Rogers said. In the meantime, “I think they’ll respond by changing policies, in part to avoid unionization.”
In an emailed statement, Amazon said 15 people out of a workforce of 5,000 participated in the Staten Island demonstration and called their critiques “completely unfounded.”
“Our employees are heroes fighting for their communities and helping people get critical items they need in this crisis,” the company said. “Like all businesses grappling with the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, we are working hard to keep employees safe while serving communities and the most vulnerable.” Amazon says it has stepped up cleaning inside its facilities, and that it is supporting employees diagnosed with COVID-19.
A Whole Foods spokeswoman said the grocer is “committed to prioritizing our team members’ well-being, while recognizing their extraordinary dedication.”
Worker protests over coronavirus workplace conditions have also recently hit companies like Perdue Farms, McDonald’s Corp. and General Electric Co., where employees at a Massachusetts site Monday protested—standing 6 feet apart—to demand the company deploy workers to manufacture ventilators in-house.
Amazon boosted its $15 an hour starting pay in the U.S. by $2 an hour through the end of April, and raised overtime pay. Workers at an Amazon warehouse in northern Italy, the epicenter of Europe’s coronavirus outbreak, on Friday said they’d reached an agreement that guaranteed workers an additional five minute break to help practice personal hygiene, and made permanent temporary enhanced cleaning protocols rolled out during the pandemic.
It remains to be seen whether Amazon will be pushed into broader concessions for the workers who pack and ship packages to customers. The U.S. labor market is teeming with millions of newly unemployed workers as large portions of the economy shut down to prevent the spread of the virus. Amazon has said it hopes to hire an additional 100,000 workers to deal with a surge in online shopping by people asked to stay home. Wholesale closings of large chunks of Amazon’s logistics network seem unlikely, say people who follow the company.
Amazon’s responses to worker agita have been rolled out in piecemeal fashion over the last two weeks. When the first coronavirus cases appeared in European warehouses, the company began doing things like removing chairs from break rooms and turning off the metal detectors employees were previously asked to go through on their way out of buildings. Over the weekend, Amazon said it would begin screening some employees in the Seattle and New York areas for fevers, a program Amazon plans to roll out at sites nationwide.
In the U.S., Amazon has also reoriented some work to spread out employees and closed locker rooms. Still several employees who work at facilities across the country have expressed alarm at the decision to keep some facilities with confirmed coronavirus cases open. The only Amazon warehouse known to have closed for an extended period—a warehouse in Shepherdsville, Kentucky—was set to reopen last week before the state governor intervened.
Amazon says it follows public health recommendations for cleaning its sites, and that it reviews video footage to determine who sick employees came into extended contact with. Those workers are asked to go home and into a 14-day quarantine.
Amazon has promised two weeks of sick pay to all employees diagnosed with COVID-19 or ordered into a quarantine; some workers, and a group of U.S. senators, say that’s insufficient.
Emboldened workers can expect consumers to back them if they don’t think companies are protecting their health, said Nelson Lichtenstein, a history professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara. “Here’s a crisis,” he said, “which makes it absolutely clear how important they are.”
As a sociologist who studies agricultural issues, including farm labor, I believe that these workers face particular risks during the current pandemic that, if unaddressed, threaten keeping those grocery store shelves well stocked.
Essential labor
It is difficult to accurately count the number of hired agricultural laborers in the United States, but official sources place the number at 1 million to 2.7 million people, depending on the time of year.
Most of these workers are employed seasonally to perform the hard manual labor of cultivating and harvesting crops. One-half to three-quarters of them were born outside of the United States, with the majority holding Mexican citizenship.
The H-2A visa program authorizes noncitizen agricultural laborers to work in the United States. This program allows farmers to recruit workers for seasonal agricultural jobs, provided the workers return home within 10 months.
But the H-2A program doesn’t cover enough workers to meet the needs of the food system. In 2018, only 243,000 visas were issued under the program – far less than the total number of workers needed to power the farm economy.
Government research suggests that approximately half of the remaining workers on U.S. farms are in the United States without legal authorization. These workers often live in the U.S. year-round, choosing to be in legal limbo rather than risk crossing an increasingly policed border. Some travel from state to state, following the harvest cycle of crops.
The mostly undocumented workers not covered by H-2A visas frequently work for labor contractors, who arrange for their transportation to work sites in shared vans or trucks.
This near-constant physical proximity to one another can facilitate the rapid transmission of the coronavirus. Seriously susceptible
The nature of their work also makes farmworkers especially susceptible to serious coronavirus infections.
Although COVID-19 tends to be most severe in the elderly and people with underlying health conditions, farm laborers face working conditions that may elevate the risk for severe disease.
Moreover, farmworkers face a number of barriers to accessing medical care, ranging from linguistic and cultural differences to lack of reliable transportation to the limited number of medical facilities in many rural communities.
These barriers are especially high for the many undocumented farmworkers, who are not eligible for insurance coverage through the Affordable Care Act, which does cover workers on H-2A visas.
Finally, the labor contractors who employ undocumented workers generally pay only for work that is completed. This means that a day at the doctor’s office is a day without pay – no small sacrifice for a worker making less than $18,000 a year. Impact on the food supply
But what would an outbreak of COVID-19 among farmworkers mean for the food system?
However, widespread infections among farmworkers could make it difficult for farmers to harvest crops. Even before the pandemic, farmers in many agricultural areas were already struggling with labor shortages.
Eventually, consumers could begin to see the impact of any labor shortages in the form of higher prices or shortages of products ranging from strawberries and lettuce to meat and dairy.
There’s no easy solution, but a good start would be ensuring farmworkers are able to follow effective social distancing guidelines, are wearing protective gloves and masks, and are able to get the medical care they need without fear of lost wages or deportation.
Americans depend on these laborers to continue putting food on their tables during this crisis. A little support would go a long way.
For more than 150 years, the United States and Canada have shared what is commonly called the “longest undefended border” in the world. And yet in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, reports emerged that the United States was intending to place military troops near the border as part of Washington’s plan to stop the spread of COVID-19.
What’s behind this threat by the United States to militarize its northern border? For the answer, look to America’s southern border.
Leaked documents revealed that U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) had requested the Department of Defense deploy more than 1,500 troops to both the southern and northern borders to support border enforcement during the coronavirus pandemic. Troops requested for northern border Specifically, CBP had requested 1,000 personnel on the northern border and 540 personnel on the southern border. The 540 personnel would be added to the 5,200 troops already present at the U.S.-Mexico border that followed President Donald Trump’s declaration of a national emergency over undocumented immigration in early 2019.
The leaked memo referred to “illegal entries” having “the potential to spread infectious disease.” The memo did not clearly explain how these troops were going to be used — only that they “will not conduct civilian law enforcement activities.” The conditions of the use of force were also unclear. Read more: Keep on trucking: Trucks must keep moving across Canada-U.S. border amid coronavirus
Canada and the United States had already agreed to close their land border to non-essential travel as a way to stop the spread of COVID-19. That decision did not mean the border would be entirely closed — the flow of goods by land was vital for both economies and would not be stopped. Cross-border commutes related to grocery shopping, studies and work were still allowed as well.
Canada’s diplomatic response to the American attempt to militarize its northern border, generally polite but at times tense, is not surprising given the asymmetrical Canada-U.S. relationship.
‘Sleeping with an elephant’
In 1969, Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau famously said that living next to the United States “was in some ways like sleeping with an elephant. No matter how friendly or temperate the beast, one is affected by every twitch and grunt.”
Because of this structural asymmetry, Canada-U.S. relations dramatically changed after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. Despite Canadian efforts to meet U.S. security demands against terrorism, Paul Cellucci, the U.S. Ambassador to Canada, bluntly stated in 2003 that “security trumps trade.”
Several Canada-U.S. cross-border regions are integrated (infrastructures, economies, tourism, etc.), but U.S. prevalence of national security has dominated the border agenda since 2001.
The traditional U.S. security focus on drug and illegal immigration on the southern border was renewed after 2001 — but terrorism and weapons of mass destruction also became one of the key national security priorities, which also applied to the northern border.
In this new context, U.S. border workers contributed to make both borders more uniform: CBP officials who are trained and on duty on the Mexican border later move to the Canadian border. They bring with them the corporate culture of CBP from the southern border — values, beliefs and behaviours tainted with U.S.-Mexico border challenges.
The Mexicanization of the northern border conveys the idea that the Canada-U.S. bilateral relationship is far from being unique — or special. The U.S. increasingly sees Canada as just another border where national security threats emerge without distinction.
But the leaked CBP memo shows there is no longer a distinction between the southern and the northern borders. Both are seen as a threat to the safety and security of the United States.
It also shows the world’s longest undefended border is just a fig leaf — an egalitarian symbol in order to hide the deep imbalance between the two countries.
By Bruno Dupeyron, Professor and Graduate Chair, Johnson Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy; and Assistant Professor of Law,, University of Regina
“It’s artificial because we turned it off,” Trump said of the economic crisis, a distinction that makes no difference to the millions who have lost their jobs and their health insurance.
During a Coronavirus Task Force briefing late Thursday following news that 10 million Americans filed jobless claims over just a two-week period last month, President Donald Trump downplayed the intensifying economic downturn as “an artificial closing” and insisted that businesses like restaurants will be “bigger and better” than before once the COVID-19 crisis subsides.
“It’s not like we have a massive recession or worse. It’s artificial because we turned it off,” Trump said, drawing a distinction that makes no difference to those who have lost their jobs—as well as employer-provided health insurance—or seen their hours drastically cut due to the crisis.
“Oh thank God, for a second I thought I was actually unemployed and not just artificially unemployed,” one Twitter user quipped in response to the president’s comments.
Amid widespread criticism that the federal government’s economic stimulus and relief efforts have been far too slow and inadequate, Trump said “we will probably do more.”
Watch: Trump’s message to the 6 million people who filed unemployments claims in the last week is that “it’s an artificial closing. It’s not like we have a massive recession or worse. It’s artificial because we turned it off … we will probably do more.” pic.twitter.com/FGVi6xIvbq — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 2, 2020
The president’s remarks came after the Labor Department announced Thursday morning that 6.6 million Americans filed jobless claims last week, a record-breaking figure that economists warned could portend an unprecedented depression.
“This kind of upending of the labor market in such a short time is unheard of,” wrote Heidi Shierholz of the Economic Policy Institute. “Given the incredible deterioration of the labor market in a matter of weeks, federal policymakers will absolutely need to come back and provide more desperately needed relief, and more support for the recovery once the lockdown is over.”
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USA Nurses in multiple states protest over 'lack of preparedness' "Protecting our patients is our highest priority, but it becomes much harder when we don't have the safe protections," one nurse said. Nurses protest in front of Research Medical Center April 1, 2020 in Kansas City, Mo. The workers were among several groups nationwide protesting HCA Healthcare hospitals claiming the hospital chain put staff and patients at risk during the coronavirus pandemic because of a lack of personal protective equipment.Charlie Riedel / AP
April 2, 2020, By Janelle Griffith
Nurses at hospitals in multiple states are protesting what they describe as one of the nation's largest hospital chains' "lack of preparedness" amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The National Nurses Union, which represents 10,000 registered nurses at 19 hospitals managed by HCA Healthcare in California, Florida, Kansas, Missouri, Nevada and Texas, is demanding that the hospital chain provide optimal personal protective equipment (PPE) for nurses and other staff.
HCA Healthcare spokesman Harlow Sumerford the company is doing everything it can to equip patient care teams to provide safe, effective care to the people they serve.
"The National Nurses Union is trying to use this crisis to advance its own interest — organizing more members," Sumerford said in a statement to NBC News.
"The pandemic has strained the worldwide supply of personal protective equipment, including masks, face shields and gowns, a challenge that is not unique to HCA Healthcare or any other health system in the United States," Sumerford said, in part. "While we are doing everything in our power to secure additional supplies, and we are following CDC protocols for using and conserving PPE, the worldwide shortage is a reality that we are addressing with realistic, workable solutions."
Nurses at HCA’s Mission Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina, will deliver a petition to hospital managers on Thursday with their concerns about hospital preparedness in the battle against COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.
Some nurses at HCA hospitals have reported that they have had to work without proper protective equipment and are told to unsafely reuse masks. Nurses at Central Florida Regional Hospital in Sanford, Florida, said they were told they could not wear masks while working because it "scared the patients," according to Jean Ross, a registered nurse and president of National Nurses United.
HCA Healthcare's spokesman did not address specific allegations raised by the National Nurses Union in the company's statement Thursday.
NBC News reached out to Central Florida Regional Hospital for comment about this allegation but did not immediately hear back.
"Protecting our patients is our highest priority, but it becomes much harder when we don't have the safe protections which puts us in danger of becoming infected," Angela Davis, a registered nurse who works in a unit dedicated to treating coronavirus patients at Research Medical Center in Kansas City, Missouri, said in a statement. "If we are no longer able to be at the bedside, who will be there to care for our patients?"irus outbreak
The union president said HCA Healthcare can afford to properly prepare for the pandemic, noting that over the past decade, the hospital chain has made more than $23 billion.
"For the wealthiest hospital corporation in the United States to show such disregard for the health and safety of its caregivers, is disgraceful and unconscionable," Ross said.
Gary Mousseau, a registered nurse who works in endoscopy at Fawcett Memorial Hospital in Port Charlotte, Florida, said it has been "disheartening" for nurses across the country "to see HCA’s poor response" to their concerns while facing the gravest public health crisis in a century.
TWITTER POSTS
Naomi Klein@NaomiAKlein "The Poor, the Sick, the Homeless, the Children, the Low-Wage Workers": Moral Leaders Demand Coronavirus Relief for Most Vulnerable - https://t.co/sjAkJz59Gv via @commondreams Twitter 2020-04-02 3:37 p.m. toomas hendrik@IlvesToomas KC nurses protest lack of protective gear for coronavirus https://t.co/LrUQFYBDG8 Twitter 2020-04-01 9:28 p.m. David Middlecamp@DavidMiddlecamp ‘This is not safe.’ Nurses hold vigil in SLO to protest shortage of coronavirus equipment https://t.co/UA9Ash2nKy Twitter7:59 a.m. Katrina vandenHeuvel@KatrinaNation Criminal, Inhumane— Despite Calls for Global Ceasefire, Trump Threatens War With Iran Amid COVID-19 - https://t.co/erVXy1k452 via @commondreams Twitter 2020-04-01 5:39 p.m.
'When We Are Infected No One Is Safe': Nurses Nationwide Protest Over Lack of Coronavirus Protective Equipment
"For the wealthiest hospital corporation in the United States to show such disregard for the health and safety of its caregivers, is disgraceful and unconscionable."
Nurses and supporters participate in a vigil at UCLA Ronald Reagan Medical Center, during a shift change for nurses, amid the global coronavirus pandemic on March 30, 2020 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo: Mario Tama/Getty Images)
Nurses at 15 hospitals across the country are set to stage protests both Wednesday and Thursday over what they say is a dangerous lack of protections for healthcare workers and demanding their employers provide respirators, gowns, gloves, and other protective equipment to help them safely fight the coronavirus pandemic.
"When we are infected, we become a real danger of infecting everyone else around us, patients, hospital staff, and a risk to our own families."
—Kim Smith, registered nurse
National Nurses United (NNU) helped organize the protests at hospitals run by HCA Healthcare, the country's largest and wealthiest for-profit hospital operator, in seven states. The union represents 10,000 nurses at HCA hospitals, which the union says has left its nurses even less prepared for the pandemic than healthcare providers at most other facilities in the nation.
The union posted a video on social media of nurses detailing their harrowing experiences from the past several weeks as the outbreak has spread to every state in the U.S., killing more than 3,900 people so far.
Listen to––and protect––nurses. All our lives are on the line.
"PPE, or personal protective equipment, is virtually non-existent at my hospital," one nurse in Oakland, California, said.
"I had a patient who was having respiratory issues and was not able to get a respiratory treatment because the respiratory therapist did not have the proper mask," said another who works in Auburn, California.
"Listen to—and protect—nurses. All our lives are on the line."
—Bonnie Castillo, NNU
Despite making $23 billion in profits in the last decade, NNU said in a statement, HCA Healthcare nurses in states including California, Florida, and Texas have fewer N95 respirators and other equipment to keep them from contracting the new coronavirus, officially known as COVID-19, than healthcare providers at other hospitals.
Just 7% of nurses at HCA Healthcare facilities say they have enough PPE to protect staff and patients if there is a surge in coronavirus patients in their hospital, compared with 19% of nurses in general.
Only 35% of nurses in the HCA network report having access to N95 respirators, compared with 52% of nurses nationwide.
"For the wealthiest hospital corporation in the United States to show such disregard for the health and safety of its caregivers, is disgraceful and unconscionable," said Jean Ross, president of NNU.
"Nurses at various HCA hospitals are reporting that they have had to work without proper protective equipment," Ross added. "Nurses say they are not informed when they are exposed to an infected patient. They are told to unsafely reuse masks and at one hospital they are even being told not to wear masks because it 'scared the patients.'"
One hospital in Florida delayed informing nurses that they had potentially been exposed to the coronavirus, while nurses at Corpus Christi Medical Center in Corpus Christi, Texas say they were told to report to work while waiting for the results of COVID-19 testing, potentially exposing others.
Calling nurses "canaries in the coal mine" in an op-ed published Wednesday at Common Dreams, registered nurse Amy Silverman raised similar concerns, denouncing the lack of transparency at hospitals across the country regarding the exposure of healthcare providers:
You deserve to know the truth: healthcare workers are falling ill by the thousands, some are dying, an unknown number are in critical condition, and there are no tests. Hospitals aren't testing their workers unless they have obvious symptoms, but we all know that sources of infection aren't limited to those of us who seek care in emergency rooms. Hospitals should be testing all of their workers in order to understand how to control infection within their facility—and the White House regularly broadcasts support of this strategy by relaying the message that "everyone who needs a test will get a test" yet the opposite is happening: we are spreading the virus throughout our healthcare systems, within our families and communities.
HCA Healthcare nurses stressed that allowing them to fall ill due to a lack of protective equipment will put many others in danger.
"When we are infected no one is safe," said Kim Smith, an intensive care nurse in Corpus Christi. "When we are infected, we become a real danger of infecting everyone else around us, patients, hospital staff, and a risk to our own families."
Nurses in USA protest lack of supplies to fight coronavirus•Apr 3, 2020 Nurses and hospital workers dealing with Covid-19 patients in the United States staged protest and shared posts on social media, crying about their lack of supplies like surgical masks and personal protective equipment (PPE) in the fight against the deadly virus.
HCA nurse protests slam hospital preparation for COVID-19
Kelly Gooch -
Registered nurses in seven states protested this week at 15 HCA Healthcare hospitals over what they say is a lack of COVID-19 preparedness, according to the union that represents them.
National Nurses United, which claims more than 150,000 members nationwide, said it wants Nashville, Tenn.-based HCA to provide healthcare workers with optimal personal protective equipment such as N95 respirators or powered air-purifying respirators and other head-to-toe coverings.
"Nurses at various HCA hospitals are reporting that they have had to work without proper protective equipment," Jean Ross, RN, president of National Nurses Unite said in a news release.
"Nurses say they are not informed when they are exposed to an infected patient," she said. "They are told to unsafely reuse masks, and at one hospital, they are even being told not to wear masks because it scared the patients."
Registered nurses protested April 1 at facilities in California, Florida, Missouri, Nevada, Texas. Protesting also occurred April 2 at additional Texas and Florida facilities.
Separately, registered nurses at HCA's Mission Hospital in Asheville, N.C., delivered a petition to hospital officials April 2 expressing their concerns, according to NNU.
HCA, a for-profit hospital operator, pointed to its efforts to equip healthcare workers to provide safe, effective care, and accused the union of "trying to use this crisis to advance its own interest — organizing more members."
"The pandemic has strained the worldwide supply of personal protective equipment, including masks, face shields and gowns, a challenge that is not unique to HCA Healthcare or any other health system in the United States," a statement from HCA said.
"While we are doing everything in our power to secure additional supplies, and we are following CDC protocols for using and conserving PPE, the worldwide shortage is a reality that we are addressing with realistic, workable solutions," HCA added.
HCA said these steps include enacting universal masking for employees; appointing personal protective equipment stewards in hospitals; and creating strategically located personal protective equipment distribution centers on hospital campuses. The hospital operator said it also has staffing contingency plans to ensure hospitals are prepared for an influx in patients; is ensuring pay for healthcare workers during the pandemic; and is offering scrub-laundering for workers who care for COVID-19 patients.
Healthcare lost 43,000 jobs in March, with job losses primarily in ambulatory healthcare services, according to the latest jobs report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The job losses — which occurred the same month the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic — included offices of physicians (-12,000), dentists (-17,000) and other healthcare practitioners (-7,000). At the same time, hospitals added only 200 jobs last month, compared to the 7,800 positions they added to the U.S. economy in February.
U.S. Secretary of Labor Eugene Scalia issued a statement on the March jobs report, saying it reflects the initial effect on U.S. jobs of the public health measures being taken to fight against COVID-19.
"It should be noted the report’s surveys only reference the week and pay periods that include March 12; we know that our report next month will show more extensive job losses, based on the high number of state unemployment claims reported yesterday and the week before," said Mr. Scalia.
Overall, healthcare employment had been growing. In the 12 months prior to March, industry employment had grown by 374,000, according to the bureau.
This story was updated at 9:50 a.m. CDT April 3. ‘When we are infected no one is safe’: Nurses nationwide protest over lack of coronavirus protective equipment April 1, 2020 By Common Dreams
“For the wealthiest hospital corporation in the United States to show such disregard for the health and safety of its caregivers, is disgraceful and unconscionable.”
Nurses at 15 hospitals across the country are set to stage protests both Wednesday and Thursday over what they say is a dangerous lack of protections for healthcare workers and demanding their employers provide respirators, gowns, gloves, and other protective equipment to help them safely fight the coronavirus pandemic.
When we are infected, we become a real danger of infecting everyone else around us, patients, hospital staff, and a risk to our own families.” —Kim Smith, registered nurse
National Nurses United (NNU) helped organize the protests at hospitals run by HCA Healthcare, the country’s largest and wealthiest for-profit hospital operator, in seven states. The union represents 10,000 nurses at HCA hospitals, which the union says has left its nurses even less prepared for the pandemic than healthcare providers at most other facilities in the nation.
The union posted a video on social media of nurses detailing their harrowing experiences from the past several weeks as the outbreak has spread to every state in the U.S., killing more than 3,900 people so far.
“PPE, or personal protective equipment, is virtually non-existent at my hospital,” one nurse in Oakland, California, said.
“I had a patient who was having respiratory issues and was not able to get a respiratory treatment because the respiratory therapist did not have the proper mask,” said another who works in Auburn, California.
“Listen to—and protect—nurses. All our lives are on the line.” —Bonnie Castillo, NNU
Despite making $23 billion in profits in the last decade, NNU said in a statement, HCA Healthcare nurses in states including California, Florida, and Texas have fewer N95 respirators and other equipment to keep them from contracting the new coronavirus, officially known as COVID-19, than healthcare providers at other hospitals.
Just 7% of nurses at HCA Healthcare facilities say they have enough PPE to protect staff and patients if there is a surge in coronavirus patients in their hospital, compared with 19% of nurses in general.
Only 35% of nurses in the HCA network report having access to N95 respirators, compared with 52% of nurses nationwide.
“For the wealthiest hospital corporation in the United States to show such disregard for the health and safety of its caregivers, is disgraceful and unconscionable,” said Jean Ross, president of NNU.
“Nurses at various HCA hospitals are reporting that they have had to work without proper protective equipment,” Ross added. “Nurses say they are not informed when they are exposed to an infected patient. They are told to unsafely reuse masks and at one hospital they are even being told not to wear masks because it ‘scared the patients.'”
One hospital in Florida delayed informing nurses that they had potentially been exposed to the coronavirus, while nurses at Corpus Christi Medical Center in Corpus Christi, Texas say they were told to report to work while waiting for the results of COVID-19 testing, potentially exposing others.
Calling nurses “canaries in the coal mine” in an op-ed published Wednesday at Common Dreams, registered nurse Amy Silverman raised similar concerns, denouncing the lack of transparency at hospitals across the country regarding the exposure of healthcare providers:
You deserve to know the truth: healthcare workers are falling ill by the thousands, some are dying, an unknown number are in critical condition, and there are no tests. Hospitals aren’t testing their workers unless they have obvious symptoms, but we all know that sources of infection aren’t limited to those of us who seek care in emergency rooms. Hospitals should be testing all of their workers in order to understand how to control infection within their facility—and the White House regularly broadcasts support of this strategy by relaying the message that “everyone who needs a test will get a test” yet the opposite is happening: we are spreading the virus throughout our healthcare systems, within our families and communities.
HCA Healthcare nurses stressed that allowing them to fall ill due to a lack of protective equipment will put many others in danger.
“When we are infected no one is safe,” said Kim Smith, an intensive care nurse in Corpus Christi. “When we are infected, we become a real danger of infecting everyone else around us, patients, hospital staff, and a risk to our own families.”
CALIFORNIA TENANTS UNION Seeking an eviction moratorium in coronavirus pandemic, protesters target Garcetti’s house
By DAKOTA SMITH STAFF WRITER LA TIMES APRIL 1, 2020
Housing activists held a drive-by protest at Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s residence Wednesday morning, honking their horns and shouting from their windows to urge him to pass a blanket moratorium on residential evictions during the coronavirus pandemic.
A parade of about 20 vehicles circled Getty House in Windsor Square for more than a half hour, snaking around the block until Los Angeles Police Department officers arrived and parked two large vehicles in a nearby intersection.
LAPD spokesman Josh Rubenstein said traffic could still flow in the area. “According to a supervisor on the scene, the patrol vehicles partially blocked the intersection to control the flow of traffic, ensuring safe travels on the street,” Rubenstein said. “Cars were not blocked.”
After police parked in the intersection, a crowd of more than 40 housing activists then took to the sidewalks in front of Getty House. “It’s not a real moratorium,” protesters yelled. “No wages, no rent,” others shouted, while some held signs that read, “Freeze all rents.”
Albert Corado, 31, who came from Atwater Village to join the protest, said he was frustrated by the city’s new eviction policy, arguing that what the mayor and L.A. City Council have done doesn’t go far enough.
“What the city has done is really ineffectual,” Corado said.
It’s unclear if Garcetti was home during the 7 a.m. protest. His spokesman, Alex Comisar, said that the mayor and L.A. City Council have “taken quick, aggressive action” to freeze rents and prevent evictions during the crisis.
“The mayor stands with all Angelenos and he will continue taking every possible step to support them through this emergency,” Comisar said.
The City Council last week approved a temporary ban on evictions for renters who are unable to pay rent because of the coronavirus. The council also waived late fees and gave renters up to a year to pay back rent after the city’s emergency order for the pandemic expires.
Council members, however, rejected a blanket ban on all evictions. Instead, to qualify, renters who are unable to pay rent must demonstrate how they have been harmed by the coronavirus, which critics say is too onerous a task given that many may be unable to get tested for the coronavirus or see a doctor.
Renters may also have a hard time proving that their work hours were cut, for example, because of the economic upheaval caused by the pandemic.
Garcetti went further this week, announcing that landlords would not be allowed to increase the rent for tenants who live in apartments that fall under the city’s rent stabilization program. The announcement covers about 624,000 apartments and it’s unclear how many of those units would have been subject to annual rent increases during the pandemic.
Organizers said that Wednesday’s protest was expected to attract members of L.A. Tenants Union, Chinatown Community for Equitable Development, NOlympics LA and other groups. The protesters said they want a moratorium on all evictions during the crisis, complete rent forgiveness and/or rent suspension, and the immediate use of hotel and motel rooms to provide permanent housing to unhoused residents.
Protesters held a similar rally outside Garcetti’s residence Sunday.
Separately, tenant activist groups held “rent strike” protests in several cities Wednesday, vowing to skip payments because of the economic downturn from the coronavirus pandemic.
Times staff writer Liam Dillon contributed to this report.
CHUTZPAH Uber Asks US Government to Give Its Workers Health Insurance
In a desperate bid, Uber wants a federal fix to the problem of its drivers wanting livable wages and healthcare coverage.
In a letter to the President, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi asked Donald Trump to do something Khosrowshahi has refused to do for years: provide "more social protections" like health insurance to gig workers:
"The current binary system of employment classification means that either a worker is an employee who is provided significant social benefits or an independent worker who is provided relatively few.
For independent workers like drivers and delivery people, and for work platforms like Uber, this presents a dilemma: reclassifying these workers as employees could result in the provision of more social protections, but the reality of employment means it would eliminate a key value proposition of this type of work. Instead of true flexibility—where workers need not report at a certain time or place, can start or stop working at the tap of a button, and can work on multiple platforms simultaneously—driving or delivering would come to resemble the kind of shift-based work that many people cannot fit into their lives."
The problem is, however, working for Uber is neither flexible nor independent. Uber functions exactly like an employer but doesn’t give its drivers any of the benefits many employers do. In New York City, Uber abandoned flexibility and imposed a shift-based quota system that restricted drivers' access to the app. As it grew increasingly more strict, some drivers were pushed to sleep in their cars to meet its demands. On the question of independence, drivers are algorithmically managed in ways that often go beyond traditional employment. Uber drivers are flexible and independent in the sense that, more so than most workers in our economy, they are expected to make do with fewer wages, less social benefits, and less control over their own labor and livelihood.
This push for a “third category,” then, makes sense as part of Uber’s fight for the right to misclassify workers, minimize labor costs, and someday achieve profitability. In California, where Assembly Bill 5 promises to outright reclassify gig workers as employees, Uber launched a $110 million ballot initiative (with help from Lyft, DoorDash, Postmates, and Instacart) that seeks to enshrine this third category. Here is Uber’s in its own IPO filing stating, in no uncertain terms, that reclassification would pose an existential threat:
"If, as a result of legislation or judicial decisions, we are required to classify Drivers as employees (or as workers or quasi-employees where those statuses exist), we would incur significant additional expenses for compensating Drivers, potentially including expenses associated with the application of wage and hour laws (including minimum wage, overtime, and meal and rest period requirements), employee benefits, social security contributions, taxes, and penalties. Further, any such reclassification would require us to fundamentally change our business model, and consequently have an adverse effect on our business and financial condition."
When you take all of this into account, it’s easy to see what Khosrowshahi is doing here—it’s what Uber has been doing this past decade: begging for more subsidies to continue this unsustainable business model. The U.S. should be moving toward universal free healthcare for all, but that’s not currently the world we live in. And so all Khosrowshahi is acknowledging in his letter is that the business model his company pioneered has left millions of people around the country vulnerable and his company has done little to fix it. Uber’s core business is ride-hailing, which relies on subsidies from drivers classified as “independent contractors” who rent or own the vehicles Uber needs for revenue, who assume every expense related to these vehicles, and who drive the vehicles for low wages without pesky benefits like health insurance. Uber’s core financing has come from private investors—it’s received more than $20 billion in investment that it has used to artificially suppress fares to attract and retain customers. Most importantly, these low fares undercut competitors. It’s not just ride-hail: Uber has expanded the model to freight operations and food delivery, on-demand labor, and scooters.
A third category wouldn’t guarantee a minimum wage, sick leave, paid vacation time, Social Security and Medicare, the right to unionize, protection from sexual harassment or gender discrimination, or a host of other civil rights for workers. It would, however, offload basic protections it should already be giving to the government.
