CWA Nurses Hope "Sicko" Will Spur Health Reform

Calling their cause "Scrubs for Sicko," CWA nurses are part of a huge coalition of nurses and doctors who are rallying around the new Michael Moore movie – titled "Sicko" – examining America's badly broken health care system.

Campaign organizers are recruiting nurses and doctors, wearing their scrubs, to be in the audience of every theater in the nation when Sicko opens Friday. The medical workers will distribute information urging moviegoers to join them in pushing lawmakers for universal health care.

Buffalo, N.Y., CWA nurses Mary Janice Keller, area vice president for Local 1168, and Mary Gavin, a member of the Local 1133 executive board, were guests of the California Nurses Association for a June 12 sneak preview of the film and a rally and hearings at the state capitol in Sacramento, where lawmakers are considering several health care bills.  They plan to take part in the weekend scrubs events and to encourage other members to participate.

The nurses said that even though they deal daily with the inefficiency, unfairness and sometimes tragic shortcomings of today's system of health insurance, the movie was jolting. Rather than focus on societys' poor and uninsured, the movie looks at the plight of middle class people who think they're taken care of because they have insurance.

"I went from laughter to tears," Gavin said. "It was very touching, very moving and informative. No matter how people feel about Michael Moore, he's tackled something that most people won't deal with. People need to see this."

Keller said Moore spent a long time talking with nurses at the California event and to two people featured in the movie – a mother whose ailing baby died after a hospital refused care because it wasn't affiliated with the family's insurance company, and a doctor who worked for an insurance company and got tired of denying claims.

Both women said they were invigorated by the overnight trip and call to action. "It really motivated me," Gavin said. "I've definitely understood that we need health care reform but the movie has motivated me to do something about it."