Photo by David Greene
Nearly 15,000 nurses across the City walked off the job before 7 a.m. on Monday Jan. 12, as nurses from three private hospitals Montefiore, Mount Sinai, and New York-Presbyterian, kicked off the largest nurses strike in New York City history. The strike was anticipated as negotiations over contracts failed to reach a resolution by the stated deadline. Read more about the nurses’ concerns in our previous story here.
According to the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) website, nurses went on strike to protect patient and nurse safety. They said for months, nurses had been bargaining for fair contracts, but allege management refused to settle on terms that included enforceable safe staffing ratios, guaranteed healthcare benefits for frontline nurses, and protections from workplace violence.
On Monday morning, picket lines were set up and packed with striking nurses at the Montefiore’s Einstein Jack D. Weiler campus located at 1825 Eastchester Road in the Morris Park section of the borough; at the Henry & Lucy Moses campus, located at 111 East 210th Street in the Norwood section; at the Children’s Hospital at Montefiore (CHAM), located on Bainbridge Avenue also in Norwood, and at the Montefiore Hutchinson Medical Center, located at 1250 Waters Place, also in Morris Park.
Outside Montefiore’s Moses campus, less than two hours into the strike, one union official told Norwood News, “Nurses are fighting for safe staffing ratios and enforce all safe staffing language in their contract. Healthcare benefits and protections from workplace violence.” The official, who does not work at the Moses campus, added, “We’re hoping for Montefiore to come back to the table to bargain with nurses in good faith.”
Photo by David Greene
In response, when contacted about the NYSNA staffing allegations, a Montefiore spokesperson said on Friday, Jan. 16, “Montefiore’s nurse turnover rate is outperforming the 90th percentile national benchmark, and represents a 51% improvement since 2021. “To put that into perspective, the national benchmark for nurse turnover in 2024 was 16.4%, and Montefiore is currently at 6.8%.”
In response to NYSNA’s allegations regarding healthcare benefits being on the bargaining table, the spokesperson said on Jan. 16 that this was “simply not true.” They said Montefiore had said from the very beginning that existing healthcare coverage will not change. “In addition to other generous benefits, Montefiore provides free health insurance with no premiums,” the spokesperson said.
In response to NYSNA’s allegations regarding workplace violence, Montefiore said on Jan. 16 it had rolled out several key programs to keep nurses safe in the workplace. “Every day this week, we have provided seamless, compassionate care in a healing and safe environment,” the spokesperson said. “Our best-in-class security protocol includes widespread deployment of weapons detection capabilities, paying for round-the-clock, armed members of the NYPD, well-trained, internal security personnel, and issuing wearable panic buttons to our nurses.”
Montefiore further alleged NYSNA had taken issue with what Montefiore allege were “reasonable measures” like rolling out panic buttons for frontline staff in the emergency department. We’ve reached out to NYSNA for comment and will share any feedback we receive.
Photo by David Greene
Prior to the strike, on Friday, Jan. 9, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed Executive Order #56 declaring a “disaster emergency” in The Bronx, Nassau County, and Manhattan due to “healthcare staffing shortages.” The order implemented the State Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan authorizing State agencies to “take appropriate action to assist affected local governments” amid the strike action. The executive order also allows physicians and nurses licensed in any state of the United States to practice medicine in New York.
Meanwhile, Montefiore said on Jan. 16 things were “running smoothly” inside Montefiore and and that patients continue to receive “life-saving care.” Montefiore’s president and CEO, Dr. Philip Ozuah, was quoted in an internal email sent earlier this week, as saying, “Our Montefiore Einstein colleagues have rallied as a team to ensure the continued provision of the highest quality of care for all who seek us out at their most vulnerable. We have not canceled even one patient’s access to care.”
In another Jan. 15 email shared with Norwood News on Jan. 16, Ozuah’s rounds of the hospital were referenced and he was quoted as saying, “A 72-yr-old man has lived in The Bronx his whole life and worked as a grocer for 50 yrs. Married with 3 children, he is critically ill, running out of time, and needs a heart transplant to live. At 3:30pm Monday, he goes into the operating room at Moses for heart transplant surgery. At 11pm, he comes out with a brand new heart!”
Photo by David Greene
Another email extract from Ozuah shared with Norwood News on Jan. 16 referenced a 61-yr-old man who Ozuah said was also ill and needed two new lungs. “He too has lived in The Bronx his whole life and works in maintenance at a NYC Dept,” the extract read. “He’s married with a daughter. At midnight, he is wheeled into the OR for double lung transplant. After 8 hours of surgery at 8:05am, he comes out with 2 new lungs!”
The email extract continued, “I spent time chatting with both patients on my rounds this morning. They’re sitting up in chairs, smiling, talking, and grateful to all of you!! And I saw a 3rd patient that is about to go in for his double lung transplant surgery this afternoon… Another day, another miracle. Many thanks to our amazing teams, our most complex and exacting mission continues…providing life-saving care.”
On Jan. 12, the first day of the strike, several hundred nurses packed the sidewalk outside the Weiler campus as metal barricades separated the striking nurses and a handful of Montefiore security guards. NYPD officers in a police van watched the demonstration from across the street. One woman held a homemade sign that had a cut-out of Hochul that said, “STATE OF EMERGENCY, BUT STILL NO SAFE STAFFING?” Several others in the crowd held a seemingly professionally made sign that read, “FAIR CONTRACT for Patients and Nurses.”
Photo by David Greene
Several other striking nurses held large billboards with a photo of Ozuah, alleging he has been given a 125% pay increase since 2020. Meanwhile, NYSNA had a truck with an electric billboard circling the block in front of CHAM and the Moses campus, displaying messages to the public.
Erica, a nurse at the Moses campus who only started her nursing career a year and a half ago, said, “I was inspired by the nurses that went on strike in 2023, and I know that those same strong nurses are here today fighting for our patients, and fighting for safe staffing, and fighting for this community to be a healthier place.”
Erica alleged the Moses’ emergency room had 145,369 patients in 2024, or 16 patients an hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. “And we have a very small ER,” she said. “We’re asking for one of the proposals that we want is a holding area, so patients aren’t waiting 40, 50 hours for a bed upstairs. They’re not in crowded conditions, not waiting in the hallway. It’s very difficult to care for patients when they’re packed in like sardines, and that’s what we want. We want to be able to care for our patients properly.”
In response, when contacted, Montefiore said on Jan. 16, “At our Moses campus, for patients who are ‘treat and release,’ meaning they don’t need to be admitted, [the] length of stay in the emergency dept has lessened by nearly half an hour since 2023…..and for patients who need to be admitted to the hospital from the ED at our Moses campus, the time after “admission” in the emergency dept, where they receive inpatient care to a bed on a clinical floor has been reduced by 35% since 2023.”
We asked if Erica thought the hospital was negotiating in good faith. “I don’t believe so,” she said. “I’ve watched the negotiations. I’ve sat in on several of them, and they’re calling us unrealistic and it’s unfair to say the quality care that we want for our patients is unrealistic.”
Given NYS Department of Health (NYSDOH) reported that for the week ending Dec. 20, 2025, there were over 32,000 positive cases of the ‘flu in New York City, and more than 128,000 positive ‘flu cases in New York City this season, Norwood News asked Erica what the emergency room looked like before she left. “We’re in the peak season right now,” she said. “The last time I worked, we had 180 patients in the ER, and it’s a space for 75 or 80, and we had 180 patients.”
In reference to NYSNA’s strike demands, when contacted, Montefiore alleged on Jan. 16 that nurses were demanding a 40% wage increase, “based on their 10% per year-over-year demand for three years, plus incremental step increases.” The hospital added, “And that is just on salary, when you add up all the things they are asking it becomes a cost of $3.6 Billion over the life of the contract.”
The Montefiore spokesperson said on Jan. 16 that to put that in context, a new, full-time RN coming out of nursing school makes a base salary of $119,423. “By the end of the proposed 3-year contract, a brand-new, full time RN coming out of nursing school would make $156,000 base salary [approximately],” the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson went on to say on Jan. 16 that if benefits such as 100% healthcare coverage, life insurance, etc. are included, the cost for a new RN out of nursing school is roughly $170,000. The spokesperson said by the end of the contract, the cost would be around $206,000. He said the exact cost was harder to know as healthcare costs and other costs are likely to go up but it’s unknown by how much.
Montefiore said the average base salary of the average NYSNA RN at Montefiore goes from $165,000 today to $220,000 base salary at the end of the contract, and this does not include any benefits.
The spokesperson went on to say on Jan. 16, “Every day this week, we have provided seamless, compassionate care in a healing and safe environment. Our best-in-class security protocol includes, widespread deployment of weapons detection capabilities, paying for round-the-clock armed members of the NYPD, well-trained internal security personnel, and issuing wearable panic buttons to our nurses.”
On Jan. 12, a Montefiore patient confirmed that a text from the hospital to patients read, “Services provided by Montefiore Medical Center will not be impacted by the nurses’ strike. All appointments remain scheduled unless you hear directly from your provider.”
Meanwhile, in reference to the strike, Hope, another nurse at the Moses campus, explained, “It’s not about the money, it’s what’s going on. You can’t have 40 patients on a unit and have three nurses or four nurses. That’s unbelievable.” Asked about ‘flu cases on her unit, Hope said her unit, Northwest 7, only had two patients with the ‘flu. She continued, “I hope it’s not a long strike because we care about our patients. We need to get back to work, but they need to treat us as though we are part of the community and that we count. We are not just workers, we are people. We count.”
The nurses continued their strike action on Day 2, Jan. 13, as reported, where Mount Sinai provided an update on their operations.
More to follow.
admin
Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.