When Fran Krugen’s late husband was first diagnosed with diabetes, his insulin cost about $35 a bottle.
But Krugen, an AFSCME retiree from Arizona, will never forget the day when she and her husband went to the drug store to pick up his insulin and the pharmacist told them it now cost $900 a bottle.
“This was medication he needed to live, and we had insurance,” she said at a press briefing earlier this month. “We looked at each other and had to ask ourselves: Do we make the house payment? Do we buy food? Or do we pay for his medication?”
The pandemic has led many of us to take stock of our lives and our goals. For AFSCME New Jersey member LaTrenda Ross, the pandemic ignited a long-held dream—starting her own life coaching business.
“I was thinking about revamping my whole entire life,” recalls Ross, a member of Local 2306. “I was looking out for things I want to do, things I haven’t been going after.”
More than two-thirds of poll respondents – 68% – approved of labor unions. That means a clear majority of voters views labor unions favorably. Among adults 18-34 years of age, 77% approve of unions. Support is also high among those with annual household incomes under $40,000.
Workers Memorial Day 2021 arrives at a moment of the greatest urgency, when the front lines of the war against COVID-19 run through America’s workplaces.
Workers in health care and social service industries are a big step closer to having safer workplaces.
On Friday, the House of Representatives passed the Workplace Violence Prevention for Health Care and Social Service Workers Act (H.R.1195) by a bipartisan vote of 254 to 166. The bill requires the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to issue a standard to prevent workplace violence in health care and social service assistance settings.
We have some monumental “firsts” to celebrate this Women’s History Month. Sarah McBride, a new state senator from Delaware, is the highest-ranking openly transgender elected official in American history. Kim Ng of the Miami Marlins broke a glass ceiling in becoming Major League Baseball’s first woman general manager. And, of course, Kamala Harris is the first woman to serve as vice president of the United States.
On this National Library Workers Day, AFSCME library workers deserve to be recognized for the value they bring to our diverse communities and the vital services they provide anyone who asks for help.
