Health Care

Maine Proposes Major Staffing Increases For Care Facilities

November 27, 2024 Rose Lundy, ProPublica. Create! Health Care, Longterm care, Maine, Safety

In the first major update to assisted living and residential care regulations in more than 15 years, the Maine Department of Health and Human Services has proposed significantly increasing staffing requirements, among other changes. The proposed updates follow an investigation by The Maine Monitor and ProPublica into the state’s largest residential care facilities. It found dozens of violations of resident rights, including incidents of abuse and neglect, as well as more than 100 cases in which residents wandered away from their facilities and hundreds of medication and treatment violations.

Meet The Indigenous Leader Using Psychedelic Medicine To Heal Traumas

November 26, 2024 James K. Rowe, Waging Nonviolence. Create! Health Care, Indigenous culture, Psychedelics, Trauma

When you’ve endured a living hell, then a visit to heaven on earth can provide a healing counterweight. This premise underlies Rueben George’s psychedelic healing work with Indigenous peoples harmed by colonial dispossession and violence. Rueben is a well-known Indigenous leader in Canada, having led opposition to a major fossil fuel pipeline that captured national attention and became a flashpoint in multiple election cycles. Despite fierce resistance, the Trans Mountain pipeline was recently completed and now pumps oil from the Alberta tar sands to the Pacific Coast over lands and waters long governed by Rueben’s Tsleil-Waututh Nation.

Michigan Nurses Win The Largest Union Election In Years

November 22, 2024 Kari Thompson, Labor Notes. Organize! Health Care, Michigan, Nurses, Unions, Victory, Worker Rights and Jobs

It is the largest successful union election in recent memory: 10,000 nurses will be joining the Teamsters. They work for hospital conglomerate Corewell Health at eight hospitals and one outpatient facility, all in southeast Michigan. “We’re so excited we can hardly stand it,” said Katherine Wallace, a nurse at the hospital in Troy, who has been a core part of the campaign since October 2023. The union won the November election with 63 percent, with more than 85 percent voting. The union committee is Nurses for Nurses, part of Teamsters Joint Council 43.

A Blueprint For Health Policy In The Second Trump Administration

November 16, 2024 Candice Choo-Kang, People's Dispatch. Educate! Antivax, Donald Trump, Health Care, migrant health, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., United States

The 2024 election of Donald Trump as president of the United States has worried many, with the question of health as one of the primary concerns. Health professionals fear the damage a second Trump presidency will have on access to healthcare and on the health of marginalized populations. These concerns include leadership of governmental health agencies, access to insurance, and restrictions on reproductive health and gender affirming care. One of the gravest concerns is the figure of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s (RFK Jr.) and what his role in public health policy will be in his quest to “Make America Healthy Again”.

Medicare ‘Advantage’ By The Numbers

November 16, 2024 Adam Fishbein, Center for Economic and Policy Research. Educate! Health Care, Medicare, Medicare Advantage, Privatization

The quasi-privatized system called “Medicare Advantage,” otherwise known as Part C, was created in 2003 as a means of expanding the role of private sector corporations in the publicly-funded Medicare system. Proponents claimed it would lower costs and improve health care for seniors. It has achieved neither of those goals; instead, MA has become a wildly profitable scheme for private insurance giants, who have become adept at taking advantage of Medicare’s billing model to claim exorbitant profits. At this point, MA is more profitable for many companies than their conventional insurance businesses.

1800 Nurses Strike University Health In Chicago

November 15, 2024 Fight Back! News. Resist! Chicago, Health Care, Illinois, Nurses, Strikes, Unions

Chicago, IL - On November 13, 1800 members of the Illinois Nurses Association (INA) went on strike against University of Illinois Health for continuing to refuse to negotiate a decent contract. Since June, the union has had 47 bargaining sessions with UI Health, to no avail. In August, a week-long strike was held, but this did not stop management’s greed. The union was left with no choice but to go on an open-ended strike. The workers are striking for higher wages, safety for nurses (and by extension, their patients), as well as family leave that lasts at least 12 weeks. UI Health has offered a measly 2% pay increase.

A Review Of Key 2024 Ballot Measures

November 11, 2024 Emma Cohn and Jennifer Sherer, Economic Policy Institute. Educate! 2024 US Presidential elections, Ballot Initiative, Criminal Justice and Prisons, Education, Finance and the Economy, Health Care, Reproductive Rights, Worker Rights and Jobs

In this year’s election, voters given the opportunity to weigh in directly on questions of economic justice showed policy preferences far more progressive than those reflected in many national and state election outcomes. Across the country, voters seized opportunities to approve state or local ballot measures increasing the minimum wage, expanding paid leave, strengthening workers’ rights to unionize, preserving public education, and protecting access to abortion. These ballot measure outcomes reflect a clear ongoing trend of strong voter support for policies that prioritize worker, racial, and gender justice—and illustrate how state and local governments can continue to play important roles in enacting such policies.

The Cost Of Corporate Profit In US Health Care Reaches $2 Trillion

November 10, 2024 Pete Dolack, ZNetwork. Educate! Big Pharma, Health Care, Iowa, Medicare for all, Worker Rights and Jobs

As has long been the case, the U.S. health care system is by far the world’s most expensive while providing the worst results among the world’s advanced capitalist countries. And that expense continues to get larger and more unaffordable. Just how large is the cost of private profit in health care? Almost two trillion dollars! Unbelievable? It certainly seems so. But that is indeed how much more money the people of the United States spent on health care in 2022 than they would otherwise have spent if the U.S. had a single-payer system.

In Vermont, Where Almost Everyone Has Insurance, Many Can’t Get Care

November 8, 2024 Phil Galewitz, MedPage Today. Educate! Health Care, Health Insurance, Profiteers, Vermont

On a warm autumn morning, Roger Brown walked through a grove of towering trees whose sap fuels his maple syrup business. He was checking for damage after recent flooding. But these days, his workers' health worries him more than his trees'. The cost of Slopeside Syrup's employee health insurance premiums spiked 24% this year. Next year it will rise 14%. The jumps mean less money to pay workers, and expensive insurance coverage that doesn't ensure employees can get care, Brown said. "Vermont is seen as the most progressive state, so how is healthcare here so screwed up?"

Not In Our Nursing Homes

October 31, 2024 George Goehl, In These Times. Resist! Health Care, Privatization, Seniors, Wisconsin

Merrill, WI — When the phone rang, it was 11 p.m. Still, Gene Bebel, farmer and retired school principal, picked up. It was Al Curtis, a one-time special education teacher and now resident at Pine Crest Nursing Home, a county-owned facility in Merrill, Wis., population 9,000. Curtis was angry: He’d gotten word that Pine Crest was on the chopping block, with the county board looking to privatize it. Bebel, age 84, leapt into action. He first contacted Judy Woller, who for years had run a support organization for victims of domestic violence in this rural county, and who had a reputation as someone who stood up for others. The two began to organize to save Pine Crest, a Lincoln County institution for nearly 70 years.

Nurses Weather Long Lockout And Win Staffing Ratio Language

October 29, 2024 Nurse Erica, Labor Notes. Resist! Hawaiʻi, Health Care, Honolulu, Nurses, Staffing, Strikes, Victory

In a malicious ploy, a hospital in Honolulu locked out its nurses after a one-day strike—and not just for a couple days, as hospitals often do, but indefinitely. The message was, you can come back only when you accept our demands. But the nurses stuck it out. They kept building their support with daily demonstrations. And in the end, amid public outrage after elders got arrested in a solidarity protest, management agreed to nurse-to-patient ratio language, a first for the state. The 630 nurses at Kapi’olani Medical Center for Women and Children struck on September 13 over unfair labor practices—specifically, ongoing retaliation against nurses who report unsafe staffing conditions, as documented by their union, the Hawaii Nurses Association.

University Medical Center Nurses Hold A One-Day Strike For Decent Contract

October 28, 2024 Fight Back! News. Resist! Health Care, Louisiana, New Orleans, Nurses, Strikes, Worker Rights and Jobs

New Orleans, LA – On October 25, nurses at University Medical Center gathered on the corner of Canal and Galvez Streets for a one-day strike to demand safe staffing ratios, workplace safety protections, higher pay and improved benefits. The strike began at 7 a.m. on Friday, when nurses joined the picket line outside the hospital. They were joined by dozens of community members, chanting loudly and proudly as they marched. Chants included “What do we want? A contract! When do we want it? Now!” Some signs read “If nurses are outside, there’s something wrong inside.” The crowd was filled with energy, with music blasting and people dancing together.

Inside The Company Helping America’s Biggest Health Insurers Deny Coverage

October 24, 2024 T. Christian Miller, Patrick Rucker and David Armstrong, ProPublica. Educate! health, Health Care, Health Insurance, Profiteers

Every day, patients across America crack open envelopes with bad news. Yet another health insurer has decided not to pay for a treatment that their doctor has recommended. Sometimes it’s a no for an MRI for a high school wrestler with a strained back. Sometimes for a cancer procedure that will help a grandmother with a throat tumor. Sometimes for a heart scan for a truck driver feeling short of breath. But the insurance companies don’t always make these decisions. Instead, they often outsource medical reviews to a largely hidden industry that makes money by turning down doctors’ requests for payments, known as prior authorizations. Call it the denials for dollars business.

As Corporate Landlords Spread, A Mold Epidemic Takes Root

October 23, 2024 Thomas Birmingham, In These Times. Educate! Corporatism, Health Care, History, Housing, Landlords, Mold, Tenant Rights

Gabriel Caban has had three constant companions in the nine short months he’s been alive. There’s Beatriz Caban, his 27-year-old mom. There’s the black-and-white blanket he refuses to sleep without. And there’s the mold that grows in the floorboards and walls of his apartment — the mold that has sent him three times to the emergency room, the mold he’s been breathing in his entire life. On Nov. 17, 2023, an eight-months-pregnant Beatriz Caban moved into Sunset Ridge Apartments, a 312-unit low-income complex nestled in the northeast corner of New Haven, Conn. She found mold for the first time that day, along with a bucket in the laundry room next door, filled to the brim with water dripping from the ceiling.

Care Crisis In Central And Eastern Europe At Risk Of Deepening Further

October 21, 2024 Ana Vračar, People's Dispatch. Strategize! Europe, European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU), European Union (EU), Health Care, Healthcare crisis, Report, Worker Rights and Jobs

The care sector in Central and Eastern Europe is facing a serious crisis, with increasing demands on care services but next to no improvement in care workers’ rights, according to a new report by the European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU). The report warns that this situation is leading to high stress, burnout, and problems in workforce retention across the region. Although the need for services such as long-term care (LTC) for the elderly, early childhood care, and support for those needing daily assistance continues to grow, a lack of investment in public care services at the national level persists.

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