ONA Launches Public Campaign: Cutting Nurses, Cutting Care campaign to stop
local RN cuts

NIAGARA-ST.CATHARINES, ON, May 10 /CNW/ - It may be National Nursing Week 2010 - a week to celebrate the contribution of dedicated nurses across the country - but it's also the day that the Ontario Nurses' Association (ONA) is launching its Cutting Nurses, Cutting Care campaign.

Beginning today, residents of Niagara and St. Catharines will notice new transit shelter ads designed to raise public awareness about RN cuts that affect their health care.

"Nursing Week is a time to recognize the invaluable contribution RNs make to the health-care system," notes ONA President Linda Haslam-Stroud, RN. "But particularly in Niagara and St. Catharines, our skilled, professional RNs have been 'recognized' far too often as a target for cost-cutting exercises and lost their positions to balance the bottom line. ONA is fighting nursing cuts with our Cutting Nurses, Cutting Care campaign."

ONA has tracked more than 2,000 RN cuts during the past year and residents of Niagara and St. Catharines have seen RN cuts at their local hospital as well as closure of their ER. Our registered nurses have been working to raise awareness in their communities of the threats to quality health care. ONA's campaign will amplify efforts to stop the nursing cuts that are degrading access to quality patient care.

"For some time, our nurses have been worried that the savings being demanded by government of our health-care facilities have been focused on cutting nursing care hours for our patients, impacting their health outcomes with little attention paid to other costs in the system," said Haslam-Stroud. "We hope that residents in these communities will see our transit shelter ads and send a message to the government that cutting nurses is not acceptable."

ONA is the union representing 55,000 front-line registered nurses and allied health professionals and more than 12,000 nursing student affiliates providing care in Ontario hospitals, long-term care facilities, public health, the community and industry.

For further information: Ontario Nurses' Association, Sheree Bond, [phone], ext. 2430, Cellular: [phone]; Melanie Levenson, [phone], ext. 2369