Dozens of home health care aides are vowing to go on a hunger strike if the City Council speaker does not allow a vote on a bill that would ban 24-hour workdays.

“She worked through some injury and so she [was] not able to sleep,” said Vincent Chow of the Chinese Staff and Workers Association while speaking of Laiyee Chan, a home health aide. “She said the brain nerve [has] some issue.”

Chan, who works for the CBC Homecare agency, said years of working 24-hour shifts without breaks as a home health aide left her with a sleeping disorder and an arm injury, now unable to work.

She’s among those fighting for a decade to end 24-hour workdays for home attendants. She joined more than 100 others at a rally in front of City Hall Wednesday.  

“Since 2015, Laiyee Chan is the first woman to come to our organization about the 24-hour workday issue,” Chow said.

Chow said his group has filed more than 1000 complaints for home attendants with similar complaints since 2015.

“I working four days a week, 24 hours,” said Zhifang Gu, a home attendant. “After four days, I can see my family.”

Last year, the Legal Aid Society filed a lawsuit demanding the Labor Department reopen its investigation into potential wage theft of home care workers. They said they’re only paid for a portion of the time they’re working at the home of someone they’re caring for because sleep and rest breaks are baked in, but they often don’t get them.

“Only agency [pays] 13 [hours] a day, no money,” Gu said.

Protesters at the rally, which was organized by the National Mobilization Against Sweatshops, are demanding City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams to allow a bill banning 24 hours shifts called “No More 24 Act“ to come to the floor for a vote.

“We need this bill to get in the floor and I believe we have an overwhelming support of council members that will vote yes for this bill and we need it to happen,” said Councilmember Christopher Marte.

In a statement, a representative for Speaker Adams’ office said: “The Speaker was raised in a union family, and the Council is committed to meaningful solutions that advance protections for workers. This is a state issue, and it is counterproductive to misleadingly pretend that can it be resolved at the city level. The state controls Medicaid and determines the regulatory and payment policies of home care, which is why state legislation exists to address these problems. To deliver for home care workers, and the patients they care for, efforts should be focused in Albany, where changes can be implemented. It is unwise and deceiving for any elected official to state otherwise.”