About 2,400 mental health professionals at Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente have authorized a one-day unfair labor practice strike.
The authorization follows a vote that began in late January and ended Feb. 21, with 92% of participating mental health professionals — including therapists, social workers and psychologists serving patients in the Bay Area, Central Valley and Sacramento — backing the action. The group, represented by the National Union of Healthcare Workers, has not set a strike date, according to a Feb. 23 news release shared with Becker’s. Their contract expired at the end of September, and the next bargaining session is scheduled for Feb. 27.
The vote centers on an unfair labor practice charge filed against Kaiser over changes to how patients are triaged for mental health services. Under the revised process, patients are no longer guaranteed an initial conversation with a therapist trained to access treatment needs and urgency. Instead, most respond to yes-or-no prompts, with telephone operators and AI determining next steps. Therapists said they are seeing more patients who need to be evaluated immediately or placed in a different treatment program.
Kaiser mental health professionals previously staged a 10-week strike in 2022 across Northern California and the Central Valley. A subsequent state investigation found that Kaiser cancelled 11,803 therapy appointments during that period.
Earlier this month, Kaiser and the U.S. Department of Labor reached a settlement to resolve investigations into the company’s failure to provide timely access to mental health and substance use disorder services.
At the beginning of this year, Kaiser was fined by Washington state for failing to comply with federal parity rules and was among 11 insurers fined by Georgia for violating similar state law.
Kaiser said in a statement to Becker’s, “We are disappointed that NUHW leadership has decided to rally their members to authorize an unnecessary one-day strike while we are still at the bargaining table and actively working toward an agreement. As part of its bargaining strategy every time, the union is once again making misleading claims about our care and access. The union made similar misleading claims during bargaining over a contract in Southern California, which ultimately concluded with a ratified contract. While this tactic is not constructive, it’s safe to assume the union will continue to try to mischaracterize the work we are doing to help our members, as part of its bargaining campaign.”
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