ANA is deeply committed to the principles of civil rights and opposes any form of discrimination against individuals or groups of individuals based on sex, race, age, national origin, religion, disability, or sexual orientation. ANA believes that nurses and students of nursing have a right to and responsibility for a workplace free of sexual harassment.
Sexual harassment has an adverse impact on the health care environment.
In the fall of 1991 a stunned and confused nation watched a law professor charge a Supreme Court nominee with blatant sexual harassment on prime time television. Stunned, because never before had there been this kind of media attention to sexual harassment. Confused, because the lines can seem unclear and sexual harassment is inextricably aligned to perception. Shortly thereafter the nightly news and national magazines carried stories of widespread sexual harassment and discrimination in the military. And it is a problem which nurses have not escaped.