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A fitness staff organization and its union sued the country’s largest chain of hospitals, accusing an HCA Healthcare medical center of recklessly endangering patients by violating federal coronavirus rules on protective devices.
The complaint filed Thursday alleges that control of Riverside Community Hospital in HCA, Southern California, did not provide staff with good enough protective equipment, such as masks and gowns, and emphasized that staff forgot about protective measures to meet quotas.nor did he alert staff to imaginable exposures to Covid-19 and emphasized staff showing symptoms to return to work.
The hospital “did not take moderate and mandatory precautions for its employees, patients, visitors and the network of the destructive effects of COVID-19, thus facilitating the spread of the virus and exposing the surrounding network to an unnecessarily greater threat of infection.”said the suit.
The case, filed in Riverside County Superior Court, is the first to oppose a national fitness care company, the International Union of Service Employees, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of its 97,000 members.
Riverside Community Hospital said it is defying the allegations and “we will do it vigorously.”
“No one takes the physical condition and protection of our staff more seriously than we do, and from day one, our most sensible priority has been to protect, protect and retain them, so they can better care for our patients.” a hospital spokesperson. “Any suggestion does not take into account the abundant work, planning and education that we have done to ensure the delivery of high-quality care in this pandemic.
Dave Regan, president of the western branch of the California-based union, said they made the decision to take action against HCA because they had been “lax, careless, and irresponsible” during the crisis.He added that the union represents staff at five HCA-owned hospitals in California and that the company has “minimized and evaded its responsibilities.”
“There are millions of life-threatening fitness care staff who perceive this to be a component of what they are committed to and willing to do, but they deserve their employers to be as responsible to them as they are to their patients and the amenities they paint,” he said in an interview with CNBC.He said the lawsuit is even more vital because Congress negotiates whether to provide legal protection to employers, adding hospital owners, to protect them from court cases about coronavirus threats at the paint site.
“It would be an absolute ethical failure and a scandal to say that you can do whatever you need and that you are responsible, that it is the debate in Congress,” he said.
The other 4 people in the lawsuit come with 3 hospital workers inflamed with Covid-19 and one whose mother, also a hospital employee, died of Covid-19.
“These other people also say they unknowingly spread the disease to a circle of family members or other community members,” the lawsuit says.”Each individual applicant is a member of a racial minority group, which makes them statistically more likely to contract COVID-19 and more likely to develop severe symptoms, adding death.”
The lawsuit alleges that the hospital’s “policies and practices” “created or contributed substantially to the creation” of a violation of public nuisance.The lawsuit also says the hospital was negligent.
The hospital caused “significant and potentially fatal damage to the health and safety” of staff and the community, as demanded.It also “caused the death of a COVID-19 worker, depriving her circle of relatives of a long-term economic situation.”and non-economic benefits.”
Hospital control allegedly pressured a plaintiff, Ray Valdivia, to paint despite Covid-19 symptoms, according to the lawsuit.He says Valdivia tested positive for Covid-19 “hours after completing this shift.”More than a month after Valdivia first tested positive for Covid-19 and still showed symptoms, he was asked to repaint unless he tested positive for the virus again, the dress says.He adds that Valdivia was tested, painted a shift and then won the effects of the moment test, which yielded a positive reading.
The hospital and parent company “adhered to CDC recommendations,” the lawsuit says, adding that some hospital workers were “verbally abused” by supervisors for requesting masks and face protectors.
The percentage value of HCA increased by more than 1% on Friday afternoon.The company reported a net source of revenue of approximately $1.08 billion for the current quarter, adding $822 million in government assistance it provided to offset hospital prices caused by the pandemic.
As of June 30, HCA operated 186 hospitals and around 2,000 gymnasiums in 21 states and the United Kingdom, according to the company’s second quarter effects report.
The lawsuit follows a lawsuit filed through the New York State Nurses Association in April when hospitals in New York and New York City were hit by Covid-19 patients.
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