{"id":56772,"date":"2025-08-09T11:23:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T11:23:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/56772\/"},"modified":"2025-08-09T11:23:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-09T11:23:09","slug":"nurses-vote-to-grey-list-manitobas-largest-hospital-over-safety-concerns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/56772\/","title":{"rendered":"Nurses vote to ‘grey list’ Manitoba’s largest hospital over safety concerns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nurses at Winnipeg’s Health Sciences Centre have voted in favour of “grey listing” the hospital in an effort to discourage front-line workers from taking jobs there amid safety concerns.<\/p>\n

The Manitoba Nurses Union said in a release Friday afternoon 94 per cent of nurses at Manitoba’s biggest hospital voted in favour of the measure, which it says its a reflection of their “collective frustration” over unsafe working conditions. Voting\u00a0was held over several days this week.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The vote result\u00a0means\u00a0the union will begin advising nurses not to take jobs at\u00a0HSC. It follows a string of recent incidents around the central Winnipeg hospital, including the\u00a0sexual assault of five people<\/a> \u2014 two of whom were nurses\u00a0\u2014 in early July.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0nurses are “making a stand,” union president Darlene Jackson said Friday afternoon.<\/p>\n

“We’re still going to provide patient care. This is not about compromising patient care,” she said. “It’s about letting nurses who plan to apply for positions in that facility, as well as the public, understand that this employer does not provide a safe environment.”<\/p>\n

She\u00a0previously told CBC News the union has been mulling the move since 2020.<\/a>\u00a0The\u00a0situation now has become “untenable,” she said Friday.<\/p>\n

The union said on social media nurses at HSC were informed of another sexual assault that took place on campus Friday morning. The union said the day previous, police also had to intervene after a bomb threat incident at the hospital’s ER.<\/p>\n

“The sexual assault of a nurse both on the property and within the building \u2026 was really the straw that broke the camel’s back,” she said.<\/p>\n

“We’ve heard empty promises from this employer for about five years on safety and \u2026\u00a0we’re at a stage now where we need to see action.”<\/p>\n

Shared Health taking vote seriously: CEO<\/p>\n

Shared Health’s interim president and CEO said in a statement the health authority takes the vote very seriously.<\/p>\n

Dr. Chris Christodoulou\u00a0said the provincial health organization has\u00a0met representatives of the unions that work in the hospital, along with government officials, to discuss the security challenges.<\/p>\n

“We understand nurses are wanting to see change,” Christodoulou’s statement\u00a0said.<\/p>\n

Shared Health’s goal is to\u00a0“ensure a collaborative and informed approach to workplace safety and well-being,” based on\u00a0both feedback from staff “and candid reflection,” the statement said.<\/p>\n

Christodoulou also pointed to some of the measures the hospital has taken to improve security, including increased security around its parkade, AI-powered weapon scanners at entrances to its emergency departments, and additional cameras and panic alarms installed across the campus.<\/p>\n

But union president Jackson said the meeting was “underwhelming,” and the grey-listing designation won’t be lifted until there’s been a comprehensive and concrete discussion around\u00a0how to\u00a0meet a list of recommendations for improving safety at HSC.<\/p>\n

The union has only grey listed facilities five times previously, the most recent being the\u00a0Dauphin Regional Health Centre\u00a0in 2007.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The MNU\u00a0represents 97 per cent of all unionized nurses in Manitoba, according to its website. Nearly\u00a03,000 members work at HSC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nurses at Winnipeg’s Health Sciences Centre have voted in favour of “grey listing” the hospital in an effort…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":56773,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-56772","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56772","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56772"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56772\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56773"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56772"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56772"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56772"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}