Friend,

Our healthcare system and the health professionals who staff it are at a breaking point. Frontline caregivers are burned out, exhausted from the moral injury of being forced to provide inadequate care, and leaving hospital employment in record numbers.

Between 2020 and 2021, the total number of registered nurses in the workforce declined for the first time in more than five years. It is vital that we take steps to make hospitals safer, to protect patients and to address the shortages of healthcare workers.

Our nation’s hospitals have failed their most basic responsibility: providing a safe place for patients to receive care from healthcare professionals. Tell your lawmakers to co-sponsor the Nurse Staffing Standards for Patient Safety and Quality Care Act, introduced by Sen. Sherrod Brown and Rep. Jan Schakowsky.

Last November, the AFT released its “Healthcare Staffing Shortage Task Force Report,” which detailed the burnout, violence and unsafe conditions our healthcare workers are forced to deal with while caring for patients. One of the solutions proposed in the report was to pass state and federal policy to address staffing levels and create enforceable safe patient levels to ensure quality care. This bill would help do just that.  

We must care for the workers who care for us. By passing the Nurse Staffing Standards for Patient Safety and Quality Care Act, we can support healthcare workers with the staffing and resources they need to do their jobs.

Click here and tell your lawmakers to co-sponsor it.

In unity,
Randi Weingarten
AFT President