On the one year anniversary of one of the worst natural and governmental disasters in U.S. history, the California Nurses Association Tuesday brought together nurses who volunteered to help survivors of Hurricane Katrina.
CNA will also announce its endorsement of State Treasurer Phil Angelides for Governor, partly in response to what the RNs say has been incumbent Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's inadequate efforts to avert a similar disaster in California.
Appalled at the ineptitude of the federal response, CNA, with its national arm, the National Nurses Organizing Committee, sent more than 300 RN volunteers to 25 hospitals, clinics, and mobile units in Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi in response to the Gulf Coast catastrophe.
Angelides Provided Critical Support on Relief Effort
Angelides provided critical support for the relief effort by arranging and sponsoring a special charter flight for some 50 of the volunteer nurses last September. A number of the nurses who went to Louisiana on that flight were scheduled to join the Tuesday press conference.
"At a time of unfathomable calamity and pain, when so many in government were on the sidelines, Phil Angelides stepped forward and found a way to make a difference," said CNA President Deborah Burger, RN. "It was a stellar demonstration of the compassion and humanity we should expect in a governor, one of many reasons we are endorsing him today."
CNA/NNOC provided half of the RN staff at a major public hospital in Baton Rouge, La., for two months after Katrina, when patient rolls doubled overnight. At other locations, many RNs worked out of tents for weeks, performing triage and critical care. A few nurses stayed and CNA/NNOC is currently providing some volunteer nurse practitioners for a free health clinic set up in an abandoned convenience store near New Orleans by a group called Common Ground.
CNA yesterday also unveiled a new national RN Response Network (RNRN), appealing to RNs nationwide to join a coordinated effort to quickly move nurses into areas like those devastated last year by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, when future disasters strike.
California Not Ready When Disaster Strikes
One of the most important lessons of Katrina, CNA and the RN volunteers found, is the critical need for assuring readiness when disaster strikes.
California, said Burger today, "is shockingly unprepared for a similar disaster, whether from a major earthquake, a pandemic, or a terror incident."
A June, 2006 report by the Institute of Medicine emphasized a "national crisis in emergency care" with an emergency medical system that is "overburdened, underfunded, and highly fragmented." The report cited "little surge capacity for a major event" and noted a 26% increase in emergency room volume while hospitals and emergency rooms are closing by the hundreds.
"California's fragile healthcare infrastructure is especially vulnerable," Burger said, "from a constellation of concerns including inadequate funding for public health services, and a badly strained emergency response system, aggravated by overcrowding of emergency rooms and closures of dozens of hospitals and ERs."
"Even in 'normal' times, California is unable to adequately provide for the emergency care needs of our population. People wait hours for care in emergency rooms, which are strained by both a lack of capacity and overcrowding, due in large part to the failure of this governor to address the growing crisis of the uninsured, to provide sufficient funding for our public healthcare safety net, and to work to secure quality care for all Californians," Burger said.
"Bad flu seasons, even serious accidents, put hospitals on overload and diversion, and leave countless families inadequately protected," said Burger. "Imagine what would happen in a Katrina-type crisis, especially in an earthquake in which healthcare facilities are damaged or a disaster in which healthcare professionals are affected. Hundreds of thousands of Californians could die or face serious problems getting access to emergency services."
"Yet the current governor has made the situation worse," Burger said.
She cited a notorious statement by Gov. Schwarzenegger in January 2005 that the public sector is a "monster" and said his goal was to "starve the public sector."
"With that attitude, it's hardly surprising that our public safety net is badly shredded and wholly unprepared for the next disaster to come," Burger said.
The Governor's failure to respond to emergency preparedness was also evident, said Burger, in a 2004 veto of a bill, sponsored by CNA to require more notice of hospital or emergency room closures, and provide assistance to local communities that would try to maintain a private hospital threatened with closure.
Schwarzenegger has also repeatedly blocked efforts to expand access to care, from leading the campaign to overturn a law that would have expanded healthcare to 1 million Californians, to vetoes of bills to reduce the number of uninsured children.
California has more than 6.5 million people without health coverage, which puts pressure on virtually all aspects of the social safety net in the state, and has a particularly severe impact on the emergency system.
"Phil Angelides has demonstrated that his heart and priorities will be with the people of California who need compassion and consistency from the top state office during a disaster, and every day of their lives. We are proud to stand behind his candidacy," Burger said.
