LISTEN: Nurses Continue to Battle Healthcare Inequities
New York State Nurses Association rally held in NYC earlier this year. Photo by Steve Wishnia.
By Bob Hennelly
On the latest episode of the Stuck Nation Labor Radio Hour, Judy Danella, RN, and president of United Steel Workers Nurses Local 4-200, updates us on her union’s strike at the Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, New Jersey. New York State Nurses Association [NYSNA] President Nancy Hagans is also on hand to discuss her union’s new contract agreement with New York City’s Health + Hospitals Corporation, which promises a $32,000 a year pay boost over the next five-and-a-half years. I can’t think of two better guests to discuss our country’s ongoing healthcare access and affordability crisis, which seems to get worse by the day with millions being thrown off Medicaid.
In part two of this week’s show, we visit with Alex Lawson, executive director of Social Security Works, which is one of the key advocacy groups getting the word out across the country that Medicare Advantage Plans — like the one New York City Mayor Eric Adams is attempting to force New York City retirees into — is neither Medicare, nor an advantage. In fact, these private companies have overcharged the U.S. government some $75 billion dollars while denying or delaying care to the most vulnerable.
Listen to the entire show below: