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International Nurse News Round-Up

See a collection of links to news stories about nurses in other nations, and how they are advocating for their patients.

Global Nurses United
December 20, 2013

Regina nurses unite for better contract deal, will hold vigil Monday

Nurses at Regina Medical Center are fighting for a better contract from the facility’s new owner. Since April, negotiators from the nurses’ union have been trying to work out a contract deal with Allina, which finalized its purchase of the Regina hospital in September. So far, the two sides haven’t been able to resolve all the issues.

Hastings Star Gazette
December 20, 2013

State Single-Payer: The Next Frontier of American Healthcare

If all the states were a giant family, Vermont would be the stereotypical Birkenstock-wearing, hippie cousin—just a little bit different and unafraid to reject the typical way of doing things. So perhaps it should not have been all that surprising when the Green Mountain State enacted a single-payer health care system, called “Green Mountain Care,” one year after the country kicked and screamed its way to an individual mandate.

Harvard Political Review
December 17, 2013

U.S. ranks near bottom on efficiency of health care spending

A new study by researchers at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health and McGill University in Montreal reveals that the United States health care system ranks 22nd out of 27 high-income nations when analyzed for its efficiency of turning dollars spent into extending lives.

PNHP
December 17, 2013

Congress Chooses Austerity Over Job Creation and Economic Growth

"At the end of the day, the bill abandons 1.3 million Americans who desperately need unemployment insurance, and does nothing to promote economic growth or job creation," Congressman Mark Pocan, D-Wisconsin, explained Thursday. "Furthermore, the legislation is paid for on the backs of the middle class and military families, while not touching the wealthiest amongst us and allowing corporations to continue to benefit from tax loopholes."

The Nation OpedNews.com
December 13, 2013

Gen. Colin Powell calls for universal health care in the U.S.

“We are a wealthy enough country with the capacity to make sure that every one of our fellow citizens has access to quality health care,” he said Thursday at a Seattle fundraiser for prostate cancer. “(Let’s show) the rest of the world what our democratic system is all about and how we take care of all of our citizens."

Puget Sound Business Journal
December 13, 2013

Nurses picket outside Sutter Tracy

About two-dozen nurses who work at Sutter Tracy Community Hospital held what they called an “informational picket” outside the medical center, Thursday, Dec. 12. The employees say they were protesting hospital management’s unwillingness to bargain in their contract negotiations with the California Nurses Association, which represents the nurses.

Tracy Press
December 13, 2013

Texas’ Other Death Penalty

The first patient who called me “doctor” died a few winters ago. I met him at the St. Vincent’s Student-Run Free Clinic on Galveston Island. I was a first-year medical student then, and the disease in his body baffled me. His belly was swollen, his eyes were yellow and his blood tests were all awry. It hurt when he swallowed and his urine stank.

Texas Observer
December 12, 2013

Registered nurses vote to unionize at Providence Hospital in D.C.

Providence becomes the seventh D.C. hospital with nurses organized under the banner of National Nurses United, a federation of nurses unions. Organizers hope that bringing Providence’s roughly 400 RNs into the fold will help D.C. Council legislation that would mandate certain nurse staffing levels in city hospitals. That legislation is languishing amid fierce lobbying by hospital officials, who contend that “staffing ratios” increase costs without improving patient care.

The Washington Post
December 12, 2013

Community Hospital RNs cite patient safety concerns at protest

Ellen Mockridge, a registered nurse at Community Hospital Long Beach for 30 years, said her life was put at risk because there are not enough nurses on staff. Once, Mockridge said she went to check on a patient with AIDS who was in an isolation room. Because there wasn’t another nurse to assist her, Mockridge said she was stuck with a needle and had to take off work for three months. She also had to take medication that she said compromised her immune system and prevented her from taking her arthritis medicine.

Orange County Register
December 11, 2013