The Stanford strike comes at a time of labor turmoil among nursing staffs at hospitals across the state. Stanford contract negotiations are to resume on Tuesday.

Throughout California, as COVID-19 infections deplete their staff of nurses, anesthesiologists and other essential workers, hospitals are canceling or postponing so-called 'elective' surgeries to repair injured knees and aching back, remove kidney or bladder stones, and repair cataracts or hernias, among other procedures.

Up to 40,000 union members at the health care giant are expected to protest in solidarity with striking engineers across the Bay Area and Sacramento.

At an Oct. 25 rally, nurses accused the hospital of violating state-mandated nurse-to-patient rules, putting patients at risk and overworking nurses to the point of burn out.

Long-simmering disputes with hospital employee unions over staffing are reaching crisis points, as almost a third of California hospitals report insufficient numbers of critical workers, including nurses, technicians and janitors.