san francisco — SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Chart Five-day strike A strike by thousands of registered nurses and other health care workers at Kaiser Permanente in California, Hawaii and Oregon ended Sunday, union and health care system leaders said.
California-based Kaiser Permanente said it welcomed back about 30,000 employees who participated in the strike that began Tuesday and ended Sunday morning. Its facilities are “staffed by experienced doctors, managers and trained staff, along with nearly 6,000 contract nurses, doctors and others who worked with us during the strike,” its statement said.
The statement said plans call for negotiations to resume this week with a focus on “economic issues.” While unions have also raised personnel and other concerns, “wages are the reason for the strike and the primary issue in the negotiations,” the statement said.
More than 500 hospitals and clinics were affected by the strike, the United Nurses Association of California/Union of Health Care Professionals, which represents registered nurses, pharmacists, nurse midwives and other health care professionals in California and Hawaii, said in a statement. She said the strike sent a message that “patient care and safe staff must come first.”
It announced plans to resume negotiations later this month.
Kaiser Permanente “cannot solve the staffing and access crisis without competitive wages that retain and employ the skilled professionals our patients depend on,” Sarina Rohr, president of the Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals, said in a statement.
Kaiser Permanente is one of the nation’s largest not-for-profit health plans, serving 12.6 million members in 600 medical offices and 40 hospitals, mostly in the U.S. Western states.