“From the beginning, SEIU Healthcare Michigan has endorsed a voluntary, pro-vaccination policy. We continue to follow science and recommendations from the CDC. We respect the autonomy of our frontline healthcare workers to be the stewards of their personal health. The decision to get vaccinated should be their choice alone.

 

SEIU Healthcare Michigan believes the best approach to encouraging universal vaccination is through education and outreach. As we continue to demand better standards, better care, and better jobs for all healthcare workers, vaccines are a necessary step to making sure every workplace is safe and healthy for staff, patients, and communities.

 

As the representative of over 1,800 union healthcare workers at Mercy Hospital, SEIU Healthcare Michigan remains committed to protecting workers’ rights and freedoms. Therefore it opposes Trinity’s blanket, one-size-fits-all vaccination policy. Trinity proposed a mandatory vaccination policy in 2014 which was soundly rejected by workers and consequently formally withdrawn by the hospital. The unilateral implementation of this policy is a direct violation of worker rights. Trinity has a duty to bargain any changes such as these.

 

This is yet another example of how Trinity continues to disregard labor law and step on workers’ rights. Trinity raked in $2.7 billion dollars of profit in the second half of 2020, but refuses to invest in frontline workers. Instead, Trinity hired notorious union-busting lawyer Doug Seaton as the co-negotiator for the nurses’ contract and continues to offer proposals that would strip benefits from Mercy workers. As with the vaccination policy, Trinity doesn’t allow workers to use their voices in the process.”

 

-Andrea Acevedo, SEIU Healthcare Michigan