Many people just walked out due to a complaint about the drugstore chain
What Are Workers Waiting for an Appointment? The Coalition Against Kaiser: An Employees’ Rights Requirements after the COVID-19 Pandemic
So now, workers from coast to coast are preparing to stage an unfair labor practice strike in response to what they see as unfair bargaining from Kaiser to resolve the staffing shortage. It would be the 18th major strike in the U.S. this year, according to Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations.
Lucas said that understaffing was an issue prior to the COVID-19 PAIN. She said executives of Kaiser kicked the can down the road at the same time as the US experienced a swine flu outbreak.
More people would stay at Kaiser if they had better pay and work conditions. It would also attract newer workers — all of which would help alleviate the staffing shortage.
The Kaiser’s Marlow Heights Medical Center in Maryland had long wait times for an appointment according to Pamela Reid, an optometrist there. But now, patients often have to wait two months, she said.
The coalition is pushing for a pay raise of nearly 25% for all of its members along with better benefits, such as more investment in training for current employees and medical coverage for retirees.
Kaiser has offered raises ranging from 12% to 14%, according to the unions. The unions say Kaiser refuses to renew its outsourcing and subcontracting protections.
But Lucas said the organization isn’t taking into account the thousands of workers who keep leaving. She said Kaiser needs to raise its wages to entice people to stay.
Lucas said some Kaiser employees work up to 60 hours a week at their job and needed to be filled. They cannot pay their bills at the end of the week.
In her 21 years at Kaiser, she has moved up through the ranks. El-Amin held several jobs in the Washington D.C. area.
She began to notice changes when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the US in 2020. That’s when the place where she built her career no longer seemed to have her back.
El-Amin said that severe levels of understaffing negatively affected her mental health while she was working as an outpatient pharmacist. She showed up every morning not knowing how many technicians would call out of work – and how much stress she’d be under to still meet quotas, despite having less support.
The Kansas City walkout was endorsed by a number of professional associations, which pointed to the well-being report.
The Nebraska Pharmacists Association said the report “underscores the persistent issues of inadequate staffing, unreasonable metrics, and harassment.” And while a number of harassment cases noted in the report cite customers as the source of verbal or emotional harassment, the majority of them identified the harassers as managers and/or supervisors.
Problems mirror at a Virginia Beach, Va., store that will open in 2021. Overwork and other problems were linked to dangerous errors in dispensing drugs — and violations that resulted in a $470,000 fine. In response, CVS reportedly said it “respectfully disagree[s]” with the investigation’s results.
In that case, pharmacists warned that the problems extended far beyond one store, similar to how the current complaints are said to extend beyond Kansas City.
The California Pharmacy Association supports the pharmacists who walked out and claims that CVS is to blame for the problems highlighted last week.
In the U.S. health care system, companies known as pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, act as a go-between for insurance providers and drug makers. PBMs were created in the 1960s to help employers and insurers buy drugs, as NPR has reported.
Two senators took aim at the PBM system on Thursday, introducing a bipartisan bill that looks to reform the way pharmacy benefit managers operate, saying the changes would bring prices down and boost competition.
Another sponsor, Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, said their bill, the Modernizing and Ensuring PBM Accountability Act, would ensure that “seniors can access the pharmacy of their choice, including in rural communities.”
A pharmacist protests unsafe work conditions and lack of staffing at CVS, a local pharmacy chain in Kansas City, says the company’s CEO apologizes
A group of pharmacy workers is walking off their jobs to protest unsafe work conditions and a lack of proper staffing at their store.
A pharmacist told The Kansas City Star that they need only one person for most of the time and that it’s similar to running a Mcdonald’s.
“Our ability to serve patients in Kansas City was not impacted [Wednesday] and we are not seeing any abnormal activity in other markets,” CVS Pharmacy spokeswoman Amy Thibault told NPR on Thursday. She added that the company has been meeting with workers in the Kansas City market this week.
CVS Executive Vice President Prem Shah, the company’s chief pharmacy officer, apologized to employees in an internal memo that was shared online by USA Today.
