Nurses Protest Outside White House for Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) in Fight Against COVID-19

Leslie begins the hour with her 'Ripped from the Headlines' news segment.

Here are the four news stories that she covers:

1. AXIOS: "White House and Congress reach interim coronavirus funding deal"

2. CNN/AXIOS: "Bipartisan Senate report backs intel community assessment that Russia interfered to help Trump in 2016 election"

3. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: "At least 7 new coronavirus cases appear to be related to Wisconsin election's in-person voting, Milwaukee health commissioner says"

4. NBC News: "Two-thirds of voters back vote-by-mail in November 2020"

She's then joined by Jean Ross, an Acute Care Nurse, and Co-President of National Nurses United, the country’s largest union and professional organization of registered nurses, with more than 150,000 members nationwide.

Leslie and Jean discuss the registered nurses who are holding a protest in front of the White House today. They're protesting to call attention to the tens of thousands of health care workers nationwide who have become infected with COVID-19 due to lack of personal protective equipment (PPE). The nurses, members of National Nurses United (NNU), are practicing social distancing and are reading aloud the names U.S. nurses who are known to have died of COVID-19.

Nurses have been demanding that the Trump administration’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) promulgate an emergency temporary standard so that health care workers are provided with the optimal PPE. NNU petitioned OSHA on March 4, 2020 for such a standard and never received a response. With no federal health and safety standard, nurses and other health care workers in many hospitals across the country have not been provided with adequate PPE to protect them from exposure to the virus.

Nurses point out that they require N95 respirators or a higher level or protection as well as other protective gear when taking care of patients who may be infected with COVID-19. With the failure of the Trump administration to protect health care workers, NNU is demanding that Congress include a mandatory OSHA emergency standard in its next COVID-19 legislative package.

Leslie and Jean also talk about the healthcare workers being hailed as heroes after standing in the street to block a right-wing protest against Colorado's stay-at-home order.

NNU's website is NationalNursesUnited.org and their Twitter and Instagram handle is @NationalNurses.