The Oregon Nurses Association (ONA) is Oregon’s oldest and largest professional association and labor union for registered nurses. We proudly represent nearly 15,000 Oregon nurses, including and the Nurse Practitioners of Oregon. Statewide, ONA members provide a disproportionate share of patient care and services in nearly every health care setting. ONA works to support policies that ensure the best working conditions for nurses and the best health care for patients.

Top Nursing & Public Health Priorities for ONA

The Oregon Nurses Association’s Cabinet on Health Policy and membership have identified the following as ONA’s legislative priorities for the 2021 state legislative session in recognition of the system improvements needed to address current and future emergency preparedness efforts:

Hospital Nurse Staffing (HB3016)

• Our current COVID pandemic experience has illuminated an unforeseen flaw in this blanketed suspension of the nurse staffing committee and its related staffing plans. It became painfully clear that our nursing workforce needed to adopt less than optimal standards in order to assess, stabilize, and address the needs of our patients, colleagues, and employers. This short-term strategy, while necessary, revealed a lack of preparedness and left nurses, throughout the state, without an ability to inform contingency plans at a time when nursing expertise was most desperately needed. This statutory amendment would center the needs of our patients by maintaining the collaborative, solution-based framework of our hospital nurse staffing committees to address evolving conditions and maintain a cohesive work environment. It’s a proactive approach to emergency preparedness that limits uncertainty and better prepares our health care system for future catastrophic events.

 Hospital Nurse Staffing (HB 3011)

• Oregon’s Nurse Staffing Law serves as a national model, providing high quality patient care, resulting from the ongoing collaboration between nursing professionals and the facilities in which they work. Unfortunately, insufficient funding to support OHA’s implementation has prevented effective oversight, inconsistent with current law. This bill, which received broad Senate and House support during our 2020 legislative session, would provide the necessary funding to bring the department into compliance to ensure staffing plan deficiencies are addressed in a timely manner.

TeleHealth Reimbursement (HB 2508)

• The COVID pandemic has illuminated the disparities in access for our most vulnerable residents. The health inequities that our BIPOC communities consistently face were visible and undeniable. We were also reminded that older adults and residents living in more rural communities faced challenges in receiving timely intervention. During a time when there appeared to be more questions than answers, telehealth provided a solution to bridge the distance between patients and their providers; it was literally the lifeline they needed. This bill would require reimbursement for telehealth across modalities and during executive order. It would also restrict burdensome limitations that restrict providers and patient choice.

 Public Health Modernization/POPs

•  Oregon has consistently made strides to address the evolving public health needs of its residents and to improve the administrative ability to efficiently adapt to the increasing demands. This bill package to continue to refine strategies to identify, deliver, and evaluate services is needed to achieve more equitable outcomes for all our residents.

Addressing Racism as a Public Health Crisis (HB 2337)

• The historic impacts of racism on BIPOC are well documented and indisputable. These impacts are widely accepted as social, economic, and political determinants of health, impacting the physical and mental health of millions across our country, resulting in disparate health outcomes; excessive pain and suffering; and dramatic quality of life and economic implications. This bill would take a multi-prong approach to address improvements to our public health infrastructure and to better meet the needs of marginalized communities. Specifically, it would improve data collection to improve interventions; fund mobile units to provide more responsive care; would convene affinity task forces to inform strategies and interventions; and would require legislative reporting and audits to ensure fidelity.

Presumption of having contracted COVID-19 on the job for essential workers when filing for workers comp (SB488/ HB3025)

•  Health care workers have been quintessentially essential workers in the pandemic and bravely face COVID-19 risk on the job daily. Still, the workers comp system has failed those who are – predictably, but gravely seriously – getting sick with COVID-19 for showing up for work. Workers compensation insurance, which pertains to employees of all types and is ostensibly their lifeline when impaired due to work conditions, places on nurses and other professionals the unreasonable standard of proving they contracted COVID-19 on the job. The situation is worsened by Oregon’s inconsistent and unfair patterns of employer acknowledgment vs. denial of worker claims. This bill is critical in that it provides that essential workers who have contracted COVID-19 are presumed to be have gotten it at work, and therefore need to jump through that hoop of eligibility as they pursue benefits under workers comp.

Universal Health Care Taskforce SJR 12 / HJR 14

•  Oregon has a long history leading health care innovation. The State’s commitment in providing access to comprehensive coverage, as a right, is evidenced in its coverage of all children residing in the state, regardless of documented status. Under SB 770, an appointed taskforce is deliberating to offer recommendations to address the access, affordability, and quality-care needs of Oregon’s adult population. Unfortunately, COVID-19 delayed the work of the taskforce by several months resulting in an unreasonable timeline to complete the stated goals. This bill would provide an extension to more fully consider options to bring Oregon one step closer to achieving universal health care for all its residents.