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Protecting Patients and Nurses
From Infectious Diseases
New California Law Requires Hospitals
to Maintain a Three-Month Supply of
Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
This landmark legislation was hard fought and won
because nurses and health care workers refused
to let the hospital industry take shortcuts on PPE
through protest at hundreds of actions inside and
outside of the hospitals. In addition to saving the
lives of patients, thousands of nurses and health
care workers stood up to fight against the hospitals'
attempts to force reuse of PPE and decontaminated
PPE.
Legislation sponsored by our union, A.B. 2537,
went into effect starting April 1, 2021, requiring all
employers whose employees provide direct patient
care in a public or private hospital to maintain a
stockpile of:
»
N95 filtering facepiece respirators
»
Powered air-purifying respirators
and appropriate filters or cartridges
»
Elastomeric air-purifying respirators
and appropriate filters or cartridges
»
Isolation gowns
»
Eye protection
»
Shoe coverings
All single-use items in the stockpile must be
unexpired, new, and not previously worn or used.
We must do everything in our collective power to
ensure that all hospitals in the state of California
follow the law and frontline staff continue to receive
optimal levels of PPE.
Contact your CNA/NNU Professional Practice
Committee (PPC), and nurse or labor representative
to learn more.
