Michigan Nurses Strike Over Staffing Crisis

Contract negotiations continue to stall between Michigan nurses and their health care facility. The nurses have been overwhelmed recently due to low staffing and an overwhelming patient load.

Why Nurses Are Striking Now

After a long span of negotiating the two sides still can't reach a compromise. That's why the nurses just went on strike at 7:00 A.M. this morning (6/9/2025).

Dina Carlisle is President of OPEIU Local 40 and represents 350 registered nurses at Henry Ford Rochester. She told local media that, 'No one wins in a strike. We want to safely serve our patients and that's why we're doing this.'

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Carlisle continued by saying, 'No one wins in a strike. We want to safely serve our patients and that's why we're doing this.' The union wants nurses' contracts to include a guarantee for better nurse-to-patient ratios, specifically, increased staffing levels.

OPEIU Local 40 Vice President Danielle Drouillard added, 'We have nothing in our contract specifically that guarantees staffing minimums. So at this time, the hospital is the sole determiner of the staffing ratio'.

What the Nurses Are Demanding

The vice president said that it basically comes down to the fact that the hospital needs to provide appropriate staffing levels, which they are not. Additionally, Henry Ford Rochester is not currently being held accountable.

Drouillard went on to say. 'There are other professional nursing standards that the hospital says they're following but if there's nothing holding them to that standard, I can speak from my leadership position, they do not audit it and they do not track it so we can't figure out if they're following them or not.'