ONA Applauds Government's Worker Safety Announcement
23 Aug 07 -- The Ontario Nurses’ Association (ONA) and its 53,000 members are pleased to hear their employers will be mandated to provide safety-engineered needles and that the government has embraced the “precautionary principle” recommended by the late Justice Archie Campbell in his SARS report by stockpiling N-95 respirators.“ONA has been pushing for the government to provide N-95 respirators, at a minimum, to protect members from contracting SARS, or influenza, or other infectious disease,” says ONA President Linda Haslam-Stroud, RN. “The government’s announcement this morning that it will stockpile N-95s is a positive thing for protecting the health and lives of our members and their families.”
As Minister Smitherman pointed out in his announcement this morning, front-line nurses and other caregivers are the heroes of the SARS outbreak in 2003; two ONA members died of the disease and dozens were infected as they did not have access to properly fitted respirators.
Minister Smitherman’s announcement that he has passed a regulation that mandates health care employers to provide safety-engineered devices will spare thousands of front line health care providers from accidental needlestick injuries. Nurses sustain 58 per cent of needlestick injuries in this province.
“ONA has gone to considerable lengths to demonstrate the effectiveness of and need for our members to have access to safety-engineered devices,” notes Haslam-Stroud. “We’re thrilled that the use of these devices will become mandatory in Ontario and that the safety of our front line members will improve.”