Essentia strike deepens: Patients caught as union, hospital dig in

By HOWIE HANSON, Opinion

DULUTH — The standoff between Essentia Health and its nurses has grown into a full-on local spectacle — picket signs on the boulevards, supportive honks from rusty pickups, and TV cameras catching it all. But strip away the street theater, and you’ll find a deeper, frankly unsettling reality: two powerful institutions locked in a war of wills, with the health of ordinary Northlanders hanging awkwardly in the balance.

On Wednesday, Essentia nurses and clinic staff — already two days into an unfair labor practice strike across Duluth and Superior — showed up at scheduled talks eager to hash out differences. Instead, most were turned away at the door by Essentia brass, who opted to negotiate only with teams from Superior and the Third Street Clinic. The rest were told to keep marching on the sidewalk. No new proposals, no breakthroughs, no forward motion.

Meanwhile, Essentia doubled down on hardball tactics. Sources close to the bargaining say the health system’s representative bluntly suggested that quick settlements would only happen if nurses caved to Essentia’s full slate of demands — hardly the give-and-take spirit that collective bargaining laws are built upon.

“More interested in busting unions than healing patients”

It’s a heck of a look for Essentia, a system that prides itself on community stewardship yet has poured millions into temporary travel nurses to keep hospital beds staffed while turning around and padlocking places like the Solvay Hospice House. You don’t have to squint too hard to see it: executives protecting their bottom line with short-term fixes while letting local trust — and vulnerable patients — twist in the wind.

But let’s not pretend this is entirely a one-sided saga of corporate greed. Union leadership, too, carries a duty bigger than just flexing muscle. They have to be realistic about what Duluth’s shrinking healthcare dollar can support long-term. It’s one thing to demand fair pay and safe staffing (who wouldn’t back that?); it’s another to treat every hospital negotiation like a cold war showdown. Somewhere in this pitched battle of ultimatums, patients — grandma recovering from surgery, the kid wheezing through pneumonia — risk becoming collateral damage.

Lt. Gov. Flanagan joins the fray

Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, now chasing a U.S. Senate seat, dropped by picket lines Wednesday to lend rhetorical fuel.

“The contrast between working people and corporate greed has never been clearer,” she said, telling nurses their demands were “completely justified” and “about patient care.” Rousing stuff, but it also deepens political trench lines that can make compromise harder, not easier.

A split reality: hospital nurses approve deals while clinics keep fighting

Oddly enough, even as clinic workers were being sent back to the sidewalks, acute care nurses at Essentia hospitals were ratifying new contracts — hammered out after grueling marathon sessions. It’s a reminder that agreements can be reached when both sides lock themselves in a room and sweat it out for patients’ sake.

The broader labor drama isn’t slowing. On Thursday, Advanced Practice Providers from Essentia’s East Market — frustrated after a year of waiting for first-contract talks despite clear NLRB orders — will launch their own ULP strike. They’ll join picket lines in Duluth, Superior and add new ones in Virginia. Their message to Essentia is as blunt as a sledgehammer: stop stalling, stop violating federal labor law, and start bargaining in earnest.

So who’s looking out for patients?

It’s fair to say Essentia has been reckless — stonewalling talks, shuttering crucial sites, leaning on travel nurses who vanish the moment contracts end. But it’s also fair to ask if union leadership always keeps patient care as the North Star, or if the gravitational pull of building union power sometimes eclipses it.

This strike, more than most, lays bare the world reality of modern healthcare: mega-systems and mega-unions circling each other like wary predators, each claiming to be champions of patients while drawing ever-deeper lines in the sand. Meanwhile, the rest of us just hope not to break a leg, because there’s no telling how many days it’ll take for the dust to clear.

Until then, we’ll keep seeing picket signs outside our clinics, impassioned speeches from politicians, and statements from both camps swearing they’re the only true defenders of local health. As for who’s right? Well, maybe that’ll finally emerge at the bargaining table — if both sides ever decide patients matter more than pride.