NEARLY 4,000 NURSES at Brigham and Women’s Hospital plan to start their open-ended strike on Wednesday, October 14 unless a contract deal is reached with Mass General Brigham leadership, their union announced.
The Massachusetts Nurses Association said it submitted the required 10-day notice for an Unfair Labor Practice strike to the Brigham on Friday morning. The nurses overwhelmingly authorized an indefinite strike last week, after their five-day work stoppage in July failed to break the contract negotiation stalemate.
“We have repeatedly tried to get MGB to negotiate and avoid a second strike, but the billionaires who run MGB have shut the door on us,” Kelly Morgan, a labor and delivery nurse and chair of the Brigham bargaining committee, said in a statement. “There is still time to reach an agreement that protects patient care and respects nurses. MGB needs to come back to the table and negotiate without preconditions.”
MGB spokesperson Jessica Pastore said the system remains “committed to reaching a fair and responsible agreement” that recognizes nurses’ “essential contributions, maintains market-leading compensation and competitive benefits, and supports Mass General Brigham’s long-term ability to care for the patients and communities who rely on us.”
“We take seriously the union’s decision to issue a strike notice and are fully prepared to continue providing safe, high-quality care for our patients throughout a strike,” Pastore said. “While we had hoped to avoid another strike, our teams have comprehensive plans in place, informed by our experience during the five-day work stoppage in July, to support continuity of care across Brigham and Women’s Hospital.”
Nurses are seeking cost of living increases, affordable health insurance, limits on the use of temporary travel nurses and protections around patient care. MGB says nurses receive annual 5 percent raises as part of a 20-step wage scale, and that the system proposed a new 2.5 percent increase for nurses at the top step.
The MNA claimed Thursday that nurses’ planned picket outside the 10th Annual Mass General Brigham Summit next week prompted hospital executives to postpone the event. Pastore called that claim “inaccurate.”
“Our focus remains on resolving the issues at hand,” Pastore said Thursday. “Through the federal mediator, we’ve attempted to schedule bargaining sessions and have been unsuccessful. We encourage the union to engage with us constructively so that we can all return our full attention to our shared mission of providing high-quality care to our patients.”
The MNA said MGB leadership has “refused to negotiate” following the July strike.
“On August 11, management said it would not continue negotiating,” the MNA said. “Nurses are calling on MGB to resume negotiations immediately and prevent the strike by agreeing to a fair contract.”
The Brigham brought on about 1,300 temporary nurses during the July strike to maintain continuity of care. The teaching hospital is one of the core health care institutions in Boston’s Longwood medical area.
Boston’s hospital ecosystem could see additional disruptions, after Boston Medical Center nurses also recently authorized a three-day strike. No date has been set yet for that action.
