Hospitals
in every corner of the country are once again buckling under the weight of the
coronavirus. But unlike earlier surges when intensive care capacity flexed to
grow the number of available beds or acquire additional ventilators, the
challenge for health systems today is neither space nor supplies—it's staff.
Even
before the coronavirus, US hospitals were short about 200,000 nurses. The
situation is far worse today. One survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation found
3 in 10 health care workers are considering or already have left the bedside.
Nurses are superheroes of this pandemic. But they're not superhuman. Tired and
traumatized after more than a year on the front lines, nurses are vacating the
practice in historic numbers.
Absent
a massive infusion of qualified nurses, patient care—and, crucially, patient
outcomes—will plummet because nurse staffing directly influences patient
mortality. Increasing a nurse's workload by just one patient increases patient
mortality by 7 percent.
Hospitals
need reinforcements. The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services has
approved green cards for at least 5,000 qualified, skilled international
nurses. These nurses all have sterling clinical records and have passed English
language tests, but they cannot emigrate because their visa processing has
stalled at the final step due to a bureaucratic backlog.
Under
the US State Department's visa processing schedule, there are four priority tiers.
Nurses are fourth—dead last—in this framework. In practice, it means they're at
the end of a very long, slow-moving line. Meanwhile, ICU beds are filling, and
hospitals are struggling to staff them.
The
Department of State must fast-track nurse visa processing. American patients
deserve nothing less.
We
urge you to take just a few minutes
and contact your elected representatives in Washington and ask them to elevate
this issue with the State Department so we can expediate the approval of these
desperately needed nurses.
Contact
Your House member:
https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative
Contact
your Senator:
https://www.senate.gov/senators/senators-contact.htm
