New Study: Health Care Out of Reach for Most of County's Caregivers; 72,000 Home Care Workers Launch Campaign for Health Care Coverage

"Today, along with Carol Lyles, Beatriz Hernandez, and the 34,000 other uninsured home care workers in Los Angeles County, Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is launching a campaign tell our elected officials that caregivers need health care too," said Tyrone Freeman, general man...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inLos Angeles sentinel Vol. 65; no. 50
Main Author Dungee, Ron
Format Newspaper Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Los Angeles, Calif Los Angeles Sentinel 15.03.2000
Subjects
Freeman, Tyrone
Health care
Health insurance
Insurance
Lyles, Carol
Social conditions & trends
Society
Los Angeles, CA
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Summary:"Today, along with Carol Lyles, Beatriz Hernandez, and the 34,000 other uninsured home care workers in Los Angeles County, Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is launching a campaign tell our elected officials that caregivers need health care too," said Tyrone Freeman, general manager of SEIU) Local 434B. "It is not fair, especially in an economy as prosperous as California's is today--in a county that reportedly has the 18th largest economy in the world--that families who get up every morning and go to work, taking care of the elderly and persons with disabilities and workers who keep one of our most vulnerable communities out of hospitals and emergency rooms, themselves must go uninsured, unable to afford health care when they need it." A year ago, the county's 72,000 caregivers voted to join Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 434B to improve working conditions such as low wages and health care benefits. The newly-unionized caregivers negotiated a wage increase to $6.25 an hour last year and now are launching a monumental push to obtain health insurance coverage. "If elected leaders in San Francisco can insure their homecare workers, and the state of New York can insure over 45,000 homecare workers," Freeman says, "then L.A. County can do the same for its homecare workers."
ISSN:0890-4340