Watch: Nurses Union Holds Tiny Protest Outside White House to Demand PPE

Roughly twenty members of the National Nurses United (NNU), the largest registered nurses union in the country, held a demonstration at the White House on Tuesday to honor nurses on the frontlines battling the Chinese coronavirus, some of whom have lost their lives, and to demand President Trump to “use his authority under the Defense Production Act (DPA) to order the mass production of PPE.”

NNU union nurses gathered in front of the White House to “call attention to the tens of thousands of health care workers nationwide who have become infected with COVID-19 due to lack of personal protective equipment (PPE),” per the press release. They practiced social distancing during the demonstration, while members read the names of U.S. nurses who died of the coronavirus aloud.

According to NewsWhip analytics, the Washington Post article announcing what turned out to be a tiny protest was among the most viral articles on social media.

According to the release:

Nurses have been demanding that the Trump administration’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) promulgate an emergency temporary standard so that health care workers are provided with the optimal PPE. NNU petitioned OSHA on March 4, 2020 for such a standard and never received a response. With no federal health and safety standard, nurses and other health care workers in many hospitals across the country have not been provided with adequate PPE to protect them from exposure to the virus.

Nurses point out that they require N95 respirators or a higher level or protection as well as other protective gear when taking care of patients who may be infected with COVID-19. With the failure of the Trump administration to protect health care workers, NNU is demanding that Congress include a mandatory OSHA emergency standard in its next COVID-19 legislative package.

NNU is also “demanding that President Trump use his authority under the Defense Production Act (DPA) to order the mass production of PPE” and calling on Congress to “mandate the DPA’s use to produce the equipment and supplies health care workers need to care for COVID-19 patients as well as to conduct mass testing that is required to control the spread of the virus.”