MEDIA ADVISORY FOR: Wednesday, January 28, 2026, at 7:00 a.m. PT

CONTACT: press@unacuhcp.org

**Strike photos and videos here, courtesy of UNAC/UHCP**

UNAC/UHCP CALLS OUT KAISER ON PATIENT CARE AS STRIKE CONTINUES

Kaiser’s statements on staffing contradicted by vivid accounts of caregivers who save lives every day

LOS ANGELES — The United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals (UNAC/UHCP) is calling out staffing reassurances delivered by Kaiser Permanente executives and public relations staff who are far removed from patient care. 

As UNAC/UHCP’s 31,000 registered nurses and health care professionals continue an unfair labor practice (ULP) strike at Kaiser Permanente facilities across California and Hawaii, frontline caregivers tell a different story: 12-hour shifts spent scrambling to protect patients and save lives without relief to eat, drink water, or even use the bathroom — because chronic short staffing leaves no one to cover for them.

“In my unit, a lot of our patients are bed-bound. Unfortunately, a lot of times they soil themselves,” said Desiree Nack, RN, Kaiser San Diego Medical Center, in an interview with KOGO. “[It’s] one of the most heartbreaking things that I see — we don’t have nursing assistants like most hospitals do. We’re so busy, we’re stretched so thin. Oftentimes it takes me ten, fifteen, thirty minutes to find another nurse to help.”

UNAC/UHCP’s recently released report, “Profits Over Patients,” captures many accounts from patients and caregivers alike of short staffing and delayed care.

“In Southern California alone, we filed nearly 14,000 staffing objections in two years,” said Zachary Pritchett, a Kaiser registered nurse in Los Angeles and one of the 31,000 striking nurses and health care professionals. “That’s not just paperwork — that’s 14,000 warnings that patients are at risk.”

“If I don’t have enough staff present, how am I supposed to keep everybody safe?” said Elisabeth Cochran, RN, Labor & Delivery at Kaiser San Diego Medical Center, in an interview with KOGO. “We had a patient that was hemorrhaging in post-partum. She had to be put under general anesthesia and intubated. When it got to the point of her needing a rapid transfusion, there was nobody else in the room that knew how to use the machine other than the anesthesiologist, whose hands were too busy to do it.”

“My daughter was hospitalized over six times in the past two years,” said a Kaiser Permanente patient from Stevenson Ranch, California, quoted in the report. “During this time the nursing staff was pushed to the limit. It was concerning that many times, my daughter was not attended to as often as she needed. It was up to us to fill in.”

“The nurses are totally burnt out because there just aren’t enough of them,” said another Kaiser Permanente patient from Sherman Oaks, California, also quoted in the report. “And guess who gets stuck waiting forever? We do. We’re basically paying for the short-staffing with our own time sitting in the waiting room.”

Kaiser’s claims of collaboration through the Labor Management Partnership also ring false when workers continue to report chronic short staffing, missed breaks, and unsafe conditions that persist despite repeated escalations. If hiring is truly “faster” and retention “strong,” staff would not be sounding the alarm or taking public action, and patients would not be sharing their own accounts of declining care, longer waits, delayed and rushed appointments, and having to provide care on their own to hospitalized family members when nurses are stretched too thin.

“People are facing burnout and moral injury and are leaving because they want to be able to take care of their patients,” said Sanayo Kondo, a physical therapist at Kaiser Redwood City, in an interview with KRON4. “Facing them and saying, ‘I can’t see you for six weeks’ — nobody wants to have to do that.”

“The wait times are of course worse,” said Brian Nitta, a physical therapist at Kaiser in Fresno, in an interview with KRON4, “and we want our company to engage with us as frontline workers, to come up with new solutions, to provide our care more efficiently and more effectively.”

UNAC/UHCP’s concerns, and proposals at the bargaining table to improve patient care, are grounded in day-to-day patient care realities, not abstract averages or press-release statistics. Addressing those concerns requires transparent unit-level staffing data, enforceable staffing standards, and meaningful accountability — not blanket assurances that everything is already working, when clearly it is not.

UNAC/UHCP members have been bargaining with Kaiser since May 2025. The union alleges that in December Kaiser management walked away from negotiations, stalled progress, and attempted to bypass the agreed-upon national bargaining process. UNAC/UHCP filed unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board, alleging Kaiser violated federal labor law by abandoning good-faith bargaining and undermining workers’ protected rights.

 

The report also cites additional concerns about Kaiser’s corporate conduct, including allegations related to Medicare billing practices and legal payouts connected to patient care, discrimination, and record handling.

WHAT: 31,000 nurses and health care workers on strike at Kaiser Permanente

WHEN: Wednesday, January 28, 2026, from 7:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m., local time; strike will continue until an agreement is reached

WHO: UNAC/UHCP members that include registered nurses, pharmacists, nurse anesthetists, nurse practitioners, midwives, physician assistants, rehab therapists, speech language pathologists, dietitians, and other specialty health care professionals. 

KEY PICKETING LOCATIONS (ONSITE CONTACT AVAILABLE/BEST MEDIA ACCESS):

• Oakland Medical Center, 3600 Broadway, Oakland, CA 94611 

• Lancaster Medical Office Building, 43112 15th St. West, Lancaster, CA 93534 

• Downey Medical Center, 9333 Imperial Hwy, Downey, CA 90242

• • • Onsite contact: Anjetta Thackeray, 909-455-5146‬ 

• Baldwin Park Medical Center, 1011 Baldwin Park Blvd, Baldwin Park, CA 91706

• Irvine Medical Center, 6640 Alton Pkwy, Irvine, CA 92618

• West Los Angeles Medical Center, 6041 Cadillac Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90034 

• Woodland Hills Medical Center, 5601 De Soto Ave, Woodland Hills, CA 91367 

• Riverside Medical Center, 10800 Magnolia Ave, Riverside, CA 92505

• San Diego Medical Center, 9455 Clairemont Mesa Blvd, San Diego, CA 92123

• • Onsite contact: Jeff Rogers, 909-263-7230

ALL PICKETING LOCATIONS (FULL LIST):

 

Northern California:

• Oakland Medical Center, 3600 Broadway, Oakland, CA 94611 
• Roseville Medical Center, 1600 Eureka Rd, Roseville, CA 95661 
• Santa Clara Medical Center, 700 Lawrence Expy, Santa Clara, CA 95051 

 Central/Bakersfield

• Lancaster Medical Office Building, 43112 15th St. West, Lancaster, CA 93534 
• Kaiser Stockdale Medical Offices, 3501 Stockdale Hwy, Bakersfield, CA 93309 

 Los Angeles

• Downey Medical Center, 9333 Imperial Hwy, Downey, CA 90242

• Baldwin Park Medical Center, 1011 Baldwin Park Blvd, Baldwin Park, CA 91706

• Irvine Medical Center, 6640 Alton Pkwy, Irvine, CA 92618

• West Los Angeles Medical Center, 6041 Cadillac Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90034 

• Panorama City Medical Center, 13651 Willard St., Panorama City, CA 91402

• Woodland Hills Medical Center, 5601 De Soto Ave, Woodland Hills, CA 91367 

• Los Angeles Medical Center, 4867 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90027 

• Anaheim Medical Center, 3440 E La Palma Ave, Anaheim, CA 92806 

• South Bay Medical Center, 25825 Vermont Ave, Harbor City, CA 90710 

• West Los Angeles Medical Center, 6041 Cadillac Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90034 

Riverside/San Bernardino

• Riverside Medical Center, 10800 Magnolia Ave, Riverside, CA 92505

• Fontana Medical Center, 9961 Sierra Ave., Fontana, CA 92335 

• Ontario Medical Center, 2295 S Vineyard Ave, Ontario, CA 91761 

San Diego

• San Diego Medical Center, 9455 Clairemont Mesa Blvd, San Diego, CA 92123

• San Marcos Medical Center, 360 Rush Dr, San Marcos, CA 92078

Hawaii (commencing 7:00 a.m. HT)

• Moanalua Medical Center, 3288 Moanalua Rd, Honolulu, HI 96819 

 **INTERVIEWS AVAILABLE: nurses and health care workers can give live or taped interviews ahead of Monday’s strike and on the strike lines, including in Spanish.**

BACKGROUND:

Across California and Hawaii, Kaiser health care professionals have taken escalating actions in recent months — including a massive five-day strike in October — to demand safer staffing, fair compensation, and respect for the professionals who deliver care. Workers say persistent staffing shortages are driving burnout and turnover, delaying care, increasing workloads, and leaving fewer experienced caregivers at the bedside and in the clinic.

While Kaiser — California’s largest private employer — claims to “respect” workers’ right to strike, the company has simultaneously circulated communications warning employees about supposed consequences of striking, emphasizing protections for those who cross picket lines, and directing workers to report union activity to management. Labor law experts widely recognize such tactics as coercive and designed to chill protected concerted activity.

“Caregivers should not be pressured or frightened for standing up for patient safety,” said Charmaine S. Morales, RN, President of UNAC/UHCP. “This strike is about restoring safe staffing levels, timely access to care, and respect for the professionals who deliver that care every day.”

UNAC/UHCP is part of the Alliance of Health Care Unions, which bargains a national contract for 23 local unions covering dozens of hospitals and hundreds of clinics from Hawaii to Washington, D.C. The vast majority of UNAC/UHCP union members work in California, where 1 in 4 residents get their care from Kaiser. UNAC/UHCP also represents workers in Hawaii, where Kaiser serves 272,000 health plan members.

CORE ISSUES DRIVING THE CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS:

• Kaiser’s unfair labor practices: Kaiser is unlawfully using a pretext about the union’s lawful and federally protected speech and conduct to stall negotiations, and to bypass the established national bargaining process.
• Safe staffing: Short staffing and rising workloads are causing dangerous delays in care, higher risk of errors, and burnout. Kaiser’s proposed wage and benefit cuts will drive more clinicians out — making the staffing crisis worse.
• Fair wages and economic security: Kaiser’s proposals are hitting newly organized Kaiser professionals — including northern California Certified Nurse-Midwives — with wage cuts tied to joining our union, and pay changes that mean longer hours for less pay. Kaiser is also refusing pay parity for Northern California Physician Assistants compared with Northern California Nurse Practitioners, even as the cost of housing, food, and health care keeps climbing.
• Retirement and benefits security: Kaiser is seeking major reductions to benefits and retirement — including active medical coverage, pension benefits, and “Plan B” — that would fall heavily on newly organized groups, including Northern California Certified Nurse-Midwives, Northern California Physician Assistants, Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists, and Child Life Specialists. These are takeaways that undermine long-term stability for caregivers.

On January 15, UNAC/UHCP released a report: “Profits Over Patients: Kaiser Permanente’s Shift in Institutional Priorities and the Dire Consequences to Health Care,” which documents how Kaiser has strayed from its founding mission and moved towards profit, expansion, and Wall Street-style asset accumulation that has created real consequences for patient care and caregiver well-being.

Kaiser claims it “cannot afford” union proposals for safe staffing and fair contracts, but the numbers tell a different story — the health care system is hoarding vast surpluses. The report includes documentation that Kaiser has raised premiums, while failing to staff as legally required. 

In addition, Kaiser has turned its employer-controlled pension investment funds to questionable areas that include foreign companies, ICE detention centers, and predatory lending. 

Across the country, nurses and health care workers are taking collective action to confront unsafe conditions and corporate practices that put profits ahead of patients. Kaiser workers say their fight is part of that broader movement to protect the future of health care.

Even as limited talks are scheduled to continue, frontline caregivers remain prepared to stay on the picket lines as long as necessary to secure a fair contract and hold Kaiser accountable for its unlawful conduct.

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United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals (UNAC/UHCP) represents more than 40,000 registered nurses and healthcare professionals in California and Hawaii, including optometrists; pharmacists; physical, occupational and speech therapists; case managers; nurse midwives; social workers; clinical lab scientists; physician assistants and nurse practitioners; hospital support and technical staff. UNAC/UHCP is affiliated with the National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees (NUHHCE) and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), AFL-CIO.