What to Know
- With a strike deadline looming, contract negotiations continued Sunday between two large New York City hospitals and the union representing more than 7,000 nurses prepared to walk out on Monday
- Nurses at Mount Sinai Morningside and West tentatively agreed Sunday to a contract that increases salaries and improves staffing standards, their union said
- Absent an agreement, about 3,500 nurses at Montefiore and 3,625 Mount Sinai nurses will go on strike at 6 a.m. Monday
A 6 a.m. strike deadline looms over New York City where thousands of nurses at two hospitals have prepared to walk out on Monday if negotiations cannot produce a new contract.
In an effort to keep talks active and nurses off the picket line, Gov. Kathy Hochul pleaded for binding arbitration Sunday evening after pushing management at Mount Sinai Hospital back to the bargaining table when previous negotiations broke down.
Weekend talks proved productive, with three more hospitals coming to contract agreements in time to thwart what could come Monday morning. Management at the two hospital where the threat is still alive, Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan and Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, agreed to the governor's proposal. The nurses union, however, did not.
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"Gov. Hochul should listen to frontline COVID nurse heroes and respect our federally-protected labor and collective bargaining rights. Nurses don’t want to strike. Bosses have pushed us to strike by refusing to seriously consider our proposals to address the desperate crisis of unsafe staffing that harms our patients," the New York State Nurses Association statement read just before midnight.
NYSNA nurses at Mount Sinai Morningside and West tentatively agreed Sunday to a contract that increases salaries and improves staffing standards, the union said. News of the weekend's final agreement came on the heels of deals made at BronxCare Health System and Flushing Hospital Medical Center.
Nurses have said chronic understaffing has left them overworked and patients underserved.
News
“We have said always our number one issue is the crisis of staffing, chronic understaffing that harms patient care,” New York State Nurses Association President Nancy Hagans said Sunday. Hagans confirmed negotiations had resumed for the first time since Thursday with Mount Sinai management.
Absent an agreement, about 3,500 nurses at Montefiore and 3,625 Mount Sinai nurses will go on strike at 6 a.m. Monday, Hagans said.
Officials familiar with the negotiations tell News 4 that the New York State Department of Health has assured nurses that they would redouble their enforcement of staffing ratios that are a priority for nurses. Because these are private hospitals, New York State has no official role in these contract negotiations, but the assurances were aimed at averting a strike by nurses who remain skeptical that management will improve post pandemic staff shortages.
Five hospitals have settled their contracts under similar terms in recent days. Nurses at Maimonides and NY-Presbyterian have voted to ratify the new contracts, while staff at Richmond, Flushing, BronxCare and Brooklyn Hospital Center reached tentative agreements.
Meanwhile, new strike contingencies were being developed, including plans to have doctors take on nursing shifts at Montefiore.
One state official said protecting the health of patients in New York’s hospitals was Hochul’s top priority at the moment. Sources familiar with the talks said state officials were preparing to send teams into any hospital experiencing a strike and to develop a system to handle patient complaints about care.
The hospitals have taken steps to prepare for a strike through patient transfers, directing ambulances elsewhere and postponing elective surgeries.
In a statement, Mount Sinai said the union's focus on staffing-to-patient ratios “ignores the progress we have made to attract and hire more new nurses, despite a global shortage of healthcare workers that is impacting hospitals across the country.”
Video from Friday showed a baby being transferred from the hospital's NICU into an ambulance en route to another hospital, a sign that Mt. Sinai started scaling back on patient care. A source told NBC New York that moving such a fragile young child is a logistical process that can take hours, with one baby in an isolette or incubator allowed inside an ambulance at a time.
A spokesperson for Mt. Sinai called the nurses union "reckless" and said that a strike would "jeopardize patients' care," adding that "it's time for [the nurses union] to meet us back at the bargaining table and continue negotiating in good faith."
But the nurses union told NBC New York that Mt. Sinai are the ones who walked away from the negotiating table instead, perhaps showing how far apart the two sides may be in the waning hours before the potential strike. They said that the hospital's negotiating team walked away from the table at midnight and canceled Friday's negotiating session.
"We want the safe nurse-to-patient rations in every contract, a patient deserves better. Our communities deserve better. We all deserve better," said Hagans.
A memo earlier in the week from the leaders of Mount Sinai Hospital, Mount Sinai Morningside and Mount Sinai West made clear that most issues in the ongoing negotiations have been resolved — but not all, and the clock is ticking.
"To do what is best for our patients, we have no choice but to proceed with our strike planning," the memo says, outlining a series of steps:
- Diverting ambulances from Mount Sinai Hospital, Mount Sinai West, Mount Sinai Morningside and Mount Sinai Beth Israel
- Cancelling elective surgeries, and scheduling only emergency surgeries at the main and Morningside facilities
- Transferring some patients. "In addition, this - sadly - means transferring NICU babies outside the Mount Sinai Health System to ensure they get the care they so desperately need."
- Discharging "as many patients as appropriate" and shifting services - inpatient care at the main and West facilities, and emergency and child psychiatry at the Morningside campus
Giselle Rodriguez is one of the New Yorkers already feeling the impact of the looming walkout.
"I just came from seeing the baby at the hospital where she was transferred,"
Her baby, who arrived prematurely, was among the NICU patients transported from Mount Sinai on the Upper East Side over the weekend. It's an unprecedented step ahead of a potential strike that could still be on the table barring an 11th hour agreement.
"It's been hard, of course I'm focused on her and her wellbeing but also healing after going through major surgery myself," Rodriguez said. "All the nurses that took care of her did exceptional work, they were amazing.
Late Sunday, the mayor's office released a statement in which the city's leader stopped short of echoing the governor's call for binding arbitration. Instead, Mayor Eric Adams asked for the parties to stay at the negotiating table until they can reach a voluntary agreement.
Adams said the emergency management operations center will monitor hospital operations in the event of a strike.
“If there is a nurses’ strike, hospitals in certain areas may experience impacts to operations, including possible delayed or limited service. We encourage all New Yorkers to call 911 only for emergencies, and be prepared to seek an alternate facility in case their preferred hospital is impacted," the statement read, in part.
