As communists, we know that the collective labor of billions of workers around the world is what creates all value, and is essential for any functioning society. As the Covid-19 pandemic rages on and leaves trails of dead workers in its wake, many workers are becoming acutely aware of how important one another’s work really is in order to preserve life, even under a system as destructive and unequal as capitalism.
One of the capitalist industries right now that has millions of workers thinking about and criticizing the system’s rigid and sexist division of labor are the healthcare systems. In major cities across the U.S. and beyond, as Black and Latin workers suffer disproportionate rates of death as a result of Covid-19 . Many hospital, nursing home, and clinic workers—mostly Black, Latin, and immigrant women—are waging bold struggles to save and protect as many lives as possible. As they do so, many are pressuring the bosses to provide the necessary resources to do so.
Comrades from the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) who work in the healthcare industry are fighting too in order to give political and organizational leadership to our working-class sisters and brothers during this crisis. Our goal is to win as many workers as possible to our vision of a communist society that smashes racism worldwide, breaks down capitalism’s rigid division of labor, and prioritizes the health of our class above all else.
Workers must unite, fight racism and elitism for the health of the masses
The work of health care workers during the pandemic has shown what the working class is capable of. The unity of custodians, nursing assistants, nurses, physician assistants, and doctors risking their lives to take care of countless sick and dying people shows the working class at its finest.
If the division between the “professionals” and the “non professional” workers can be overcome, healthcare workers constitute an incredible force in an industry which employs over 11 percent  of the U.S. working class. Black workers are the most militant workers in this industry and continue to take the lead struggle after struggle.
The elitist divisions between professional (nurses and doctors) and nonprofessional workers is a major stumbling block and the most potent weapon the bosses have in combating the militancy of healthcare workers. Most of the doctors are now salaried employees and the possibility of starting a private practice is increasingly small. They do not own their means of production. Wages are relatively high because of the cost of reproducing their labor power and they have artificially maintained a racist and sexist guild structure.
Custodians, nursing assistants, and increasingly nurses are disproportionately Black, Latin, Asian and immigrant workers. This multiracial character of workers is fertile ground for struggling against racism and sexism and building multiracial working-class unity around a revolutionary communist perspective.
Mobilize for communist revolution
Working-class fighters, including many PLP comrades, have been hosting regular conferences in order to build a strategy to win during the current period. After much discussion, we have built a plan that can help us build our mass, fighting, communist Party on multiple fronts.
Through social media and other outlets, we have begun to compile and share research with other workers that exposes the disgustingly racist nature of the capitalist profit system. Specifically, how Black, Latin, immigrant and incarcerated workers are suffering and dying at shocking rates as a result of Covid-19. We have explained that these deadly inequalities are ingrained in capitalism, which needs to divide the working class by race, nation, and gender to reap maximum profits.
In cities like Chicago, we have begun to lead struggles in hospitals, pressuring the bosses to provide lifesaving protective gear, better staffing, and hazard pay for workers across the board. We are building upon relationships that we have forged in struggle with many co-workers over the years from many different job categories. Consistently we have actively worked to overcome racist, sexist and elitist divisions in our workplaces and build a more egalitarian communist vision of how healthcare should function. We have developed scientifically-based guidelines for our comrades and other fighters to follow when participating in rallies, including appropriate physical distancing and protective gear.
Finally, many of us have also participated in car rallies and shared information with peers to challenge the deadly racist outbreaks of Covid-19 in major jails across the country. We are building upon long-term struggles for decarceration in various public health organizations as key struggles to overcome further unnecessary illness and death of workers.
Away with all capitalist pests
Following the example of communists in the Soviet Union and China after their socialist revolutions, we can draw a lot of inspiration and knowledge on the advances that can be made for the health of the masses. This is especially when labor is collectively organized and shared, and essentials like hospitals and medicine are no longer about profit. We are proud and excited to win more workers to that vision and to fight for a communist world where racist capitalist pandemics are a relic of the past.