Thousands of Kaiser Permanente mental health workers in Southern California are set to hit the picket line Monday.
Workers plan to march outside Kaiser medical centers in Los Angeles and San Diego at 6 a.m.
The National Union of Health Care workers says the strike will not end until a deal is reached on what they describe as fair pay for workers, a restoration of pensions, and allowances for more time with patients.
“We’re not just doing this for ourselves. We’re doing this for the patients and we’re doing this for the profession because the way Kaiser is handling mental health, it’s not the way it’s meant to be. So, we’re doing this for the future of mental health as a whole,” Psychiatric Counselor Natalie Espinoza said.
Kaiser released a statement Monday morning regarding the strike and denied that workers want to spend more time with patients:
“Today’s strike is entirely unnecessary and unfortunately not surprising. NUHW leaders have been threatening to strike since before we began bargaining in July. The union has been slow-walking negotiations, despite the strong proposals Kaiser Permanente has put on the table. The union’s proposals at the table have been overreaching and unreasonable … The union isn’t calling for more time to care for patients. It is demanding more money for therapists to spend LESS time seeing patients,” a portion of the statement read.
