$6,000 a week: Demand for nurses amid COVID surge has hospitals bracing for staffing shortages - The Mercury News

Already, traveling nurse companies are seeing a record number of job openings — and skyrocketing pay rates — as hospitals scramble to staff up to meet the need brought on by soaring COVID-hospitalization rates.

In the last several days, California has recorded more cases than ever — topping 20,000 new cases on Monday alone.

And while in past years and even earlier in the pandemic, all hospitals didn’t need nurses at the same time, that’s changed.

Hospitals are drawing from the same finite pool of nurses and, in some cases, extending contracts — meaning other hospitals are left scrambling.

Trusted Health is seeing nurses who took time off return to the workforce, and those who had joined the faculty at nursing schools headed back into the trenches.

Gavin Newsom’s call for retired or out-of-work medical workers to join what he called the California Health Corps resulted in more than 90,000 volunteers, only a tiny fraction have actually been dispatched, with many stymied by expired medical licenses and other bureaucratic issues.

“There are approximately 900 California Health Corps cadre members available to support California’s response,” the California Department of Public Health told this news organization Wednesday in response to questions about the governor’s high profile call to arms this spring.