RNs today are embracing her legacy, by working to make health care facilities mercury-free. In response to the problem of mercury pollution, health care providers like Kaiser Permanente, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire and New York's Beth Israel Medical Centers are creating model programs for mercury elimination. A mercury fever thermometer, like those used in the home, contains enough mercury to potentially contaminate 9,000 cans of tuna fish. Mercury reaches its highest concentrations in top predator fish like tuna, swordfish and shark. The coalition is dedicated to environmentally responsible health care.
Tuna fish has too much mercury to be eaten regularly by pregnant women and young children.
These hospitals are voluntarily eliminating mercury because of the threat to public health and showing other health care providers and other industries that it can be done. We need to address the long-term consequences of treatment options and challenge ourselves to devise effective alternatives that do less environmental harm. Health Care Without Harm is an international campaign made up of health care professionals, hospitals, environmental advocates, organizations of individuals with illnesses such as breast cancer and endometriosis, and religious organizations. The campaign's mission is to transform the health care industry so it is no longer a source of environmental harm by eliminating the pollution in health care practices without compromising safety or care. ANA advances the nursing profession by fostering high standards of nursing practice, promoting the economic and general welfare of nurses in the workplace, projecting a positive and realistic view of nursing, and by lobbying the Congress and regulatory agencies on health care issues affecting nurses and the public.