Kaiser Permanente and unions shake hands on a tentative agreement with the help of U.S. Labor Secretary Julie Su

Kaiser Permanente and a coalition of unions have finally shaken hands on a tentative agreement, a week after more than 60,000 workers left their jobs in protest.

On Friday morning, the tentative agreement was announced on X (Formerly Twitter) by SEIU United Healthcare Workers West, writing, "The frontline healthcare workers of the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions are excited to have reached a tentative agreement with Kaiser Permanente. We are thankful for the instrumental support of Acting US Labor Secretary Julie Su.

A full announcement will follow shortly."

Last week, more than 75,000 workers went on strike in eight states and the District of Columbia.

Among those who went on strike were laboratory workers, licensed vocational nurses medical assistants, pharmacy technicians, respiratory therapists as well and housekeepers, all of whom are essential in a medical environment on a daily basis and whose absence can create a dent in providing adequate care to patients.

As reported earlier by us, the demands of the workers on the protest were higher wages and higher staffing levels as the shortage in staff at clinics and hospitals was making it impossible to care for patients judiciously.

Additionally, the workers also stated that the raise provided to them by Kaiser was not keeping up with the rising costs of day-to-day life.

Kaiser leaders defended themselves saying they had been trying to reach an agreement in good faith and argued that the organization had been working to address the effects of a national crunch on healthcare staffing, successfully hitting a target to hire 10,000 new employees represented by the coalition.

Days after the first strike ended, the coalition of unions had warned that another strike of a bigger scale could be organised from November 1 to November 8, after a union contract covering workers in the Seattle area expired.

The tentative deal if successful, is expected to avert the forewarned strike.

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