Friend,

Nurses and health professionals have devoted themselves to a grueling profession with compassion and perseverance. But despite backbreaking understaffing, terrifying workplace safety issues and dizzying schedules, nurses and other healthcare professionals remain at the bedside of patients, providing care for our communities when they need it most.

This week, in honor of National Nurses Week, let’s take action and show we care for the professionals who care for us. Tell your lawmaker to pass safe staffing legislation so that nurses and health professionals have the resources they need to provide quality patient care.

The Nurse Staffing Standards for Hospital Patient Safety and Quality Care Act (H.R. 2530/S. 1113) would require specific nurse-to-patient staffing levels and provide the funding to implement these safe standards, to ensure that patients get the care they need to recover and thrive and that nurses have sustainable workloads to provide that care.

Our support for this bill is part of our Code Red campaign to staff our healthcare facilities and fix our broken healthcare system. The Code Red campaign is a response by the AFT and our healthcare affiliates around the country to lead efforts to secure safe patient limits and other crucial protections to improve the quality of care our patients receive.

From state and federal legislation requiring safe patient levels, to enforceable workplace violence standards, to collectively bargained contracts that help recruit and retain frontline caregivers, the AFT is committed to leveraging a variety of strategic approaches to improve the quality of care for our patients.

We know that when it comes to thanking people for their work, actions speak louder than words. This is our chance to take action. In honor of National Nurses Week, tell your lawmakers to pass the safe staffing legislation our nurses are demanding.

In unity,
Randi Weingarten
AFT President

P.S. Learn more about our Code Red campaign and how we’re working to safely staff our country’s healthcare facilities by visiting www.aft.org/CodeRed.