Local 5105 Bargaining Update #7

At yesterday’s session (5/21/2026), over 20 members joined our bargaining committee to give powerful testimony about the effect that unsafe staffing is having at Virtua. One member spoke about having to continue to work after being attacked by a patient because there was not enough staff to cover her patients. Others spoke passionately about how they have thought about leaving the profession because of how much it hurts to not be able to give their patients the care they know they can because they have too many patients. And others talked about how so many members are being harmed financially because of receiving HET only to leave units short when there are admissions that are easy to anticipate. You could clearly see the effect that all these stories had on the other side of the table. After being told by management that there is no staffing problem in the hospital it was important for Virtua to hear directly from you, and we truly thank the members who showed up to make it clear that we are willing to do whatever it takes to win enforceable nurse to patient ratios in our contract.

In the morning, management gave us a presentation on the use of virtual nurses in the Hospital. We asked many questions and expressed our concerns around maintaining the bedside nurses clinical authority and ensuring that these programs are not used to reduce staff or discipline members. We have made proposals on both AI and virtual nurses, and we are committed to protecting our members as this new technology emerges. We had some discussion on other proposals as well but still have not gotten a response from management on our last staffing proposal.  They apparently continue to believe that their proposal to put their current “target staffing guidelines” in a couple of units into the contract is sufficient.

Next Thursday the 28th, we will be holding our Car Caravan at 6:00pm starting in front of the Aldi at Lumberton Plaza. We’ll be circling the hospital along with our giant mobile billboard to send one more clear message to management right before our last scheduled bargaining day. This is the last major public action we’re taking before our last scheduled day of bargaining, so we strongly encourage everyone who can to participate! The whole community is invited to come!!! Here’s the link to register: Here’s the link to register.

We have continued to build and demonstrated a tremendous amount of power and unity, and we are seeing the results. As we enter the final week of bargaining, now is the time to push even harder as we fight for a contract that we and our patients deserve. The 726 nurses who voted YES can’t be wrong!!! It’s time for Virtua to get it done!!!

In solidarity,

Your Local 5105 Bargaining Committee