From nurse education, clinical, or workforce issues through to healthy living, Nursing Review has it covered.

Two election year campaigns are underway by health sector unions calling for an urgent $1.8 billion funding injection into the health system.

The YesWeCare campaign "health underfunding" roadshows kickoff in Bluff on March 4 and travels up the country to finish at Cape Reinga on March 29. The campaign is lead by an coalition of health and community workers  - including health sector unions the Public Service Association (PSA), New Zealand Nurses Organisation (NZNO), E tū, First Union and Unite – which between them represent 83,000 workers in health.

Also launched in February is NZNO's Shout Out for Health campaign which is encouraging nurses to speak up about the impacts of current health funding on the care they provide.

Both campaigns quote a Council of Trade Unions (CTU) figure released late last year that estimates Vote Health funding needs to be boosted by an extra $1.8 billion in the Budget in May to restore health funding levels to what they were in 2009-2010.

CTU economist Bill Rosenberg said the extra $1.8 billion (on top of funding allocated to Vote Health by the Government in last year's Budget) was calculated as the Budget 2017 increase needed to restore health operational funding in 2017-18 to the same level of GDP (gross domestic product) as it was in 2009-2010.* 

NZNO chief executive Memo Musa said the "impact of inadequate funding due to Government under spending is starting to cut, squeeze and burn". Musa said members were telling NZNO that underfunding was now "affecting patient safety, access to care, triggering care-rationing, health-worker burn out and straining the infrastructure".

Glenn Barclay, the PSA national secretary, said the YesWeCare campaign aims to collect the stories of ordinary Kiwi's who've been affected by underfunding in the health system.  He said that Consumer NZ's recent Cost of Living survey found healthcare costs were New Zealanders' greatest concern above housing.

The Shout Out for Health campaign is calling for:

• $1.8 billion injected into health funding
• full employment of graduate nurses including funding a NETP (nursing entry to practice) place for all new graduates (particularly Māori and Pacific graduates)
• Planning and career development for all nurses
• Nurses supported to continue to upskill through postgraduate education and training to work in aged care, community and primary care
• Safe staffing through improved links between service planning and health workforce requirement estimates using the Care Capacity Demand Management System
• A government-led examination of mental health service delivery

More information: Shout Out for Health and YesWeCare.nz

The YesWeCare campaign is the local arm of a global campaign, Public Health for All, run by the Public Service International (PSI). 

*Rosenberg said the $1.8 billion estimate didn't include capital needs and was based on a Treasury estimate of GDP in 2018.