Despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the Stanford Hospital system is cutting staffing and pay.
Officials say the system has not experienced a surge but has seen a 40% drop in emergency room visits and suspended all elective surgeries, which has led to a significant drop in revenue.
Employees were notified last week that they are required to take either a 20% pay cut or use paid vacation and sick leave. Applicable employees can also take unpaid leave and then file for unemployment insurance. The cuts will last at least 10 weeks.
“This is a pandemic. And then for them to cut people back by 20% is mind-blowing,” says Linda Cornell, unit secretary at a Stanford nursing station.
“To get this kind of news in the middle of a pandemic was shocking,” says Steve Trossman with the Service Employees International Union United Healthcare Workers West, a union that represents thousands of workers affected by the cuts. “These people who go into the hospital every day, put their health and lives on the line - to most people they are healthcare heroes and to Stanford they appear to be just another line on a balance sheet… it’s outrageous and it’s absolutely wrong.”
The cuts impact workers across many units including nurses, rehabilitation, housekeeping, labs and more.
Trossman says to many of the workers he represents who make between $60-65,000 a year, a 20% pay cut is devastating.
Cornell believes this could also impact patient care. “There’s delays in getting labs run on time or labs drawn on time, there’s delay in transporting patients throughout the hospital for different tests or even discharging them.”
It is not clear how many workers may have chosen the option to take time off.
