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About 200 Stanford Hospital workers held a lively and noisy rally and march at the hospital and parts of the nearby campus late Wednesday afternoon, briefly blocking traffic at Campus and Palm drives. No arrests were made.

The workers were members of Service Employees International Union, Local 715, representing about 1,200 food and service workers at Stanford and Lucile Packard Children’s hospitals.

The SEIU contract with the hospitals expires on Friday and the union has been holding demonstrations to try to put pressure on hospital negotiators. Gayle Tiller, SEIU communications director, said the two sides are far apart on issues such as wages and health care benefits.

Negotiating sessions have been scheduled for Thursday and Friday.

— Don Kazak