Wealthiest Hospitals Got Billions in Bailout for Struggling Health Providers
Source: NYT
Twenty large chains received more than $5 billion in federal grants even while sitting on more than $100 billion in cash.
A multibillion-dollar institution in the Seattle area invests in hedge funds, runs a pair of venture capital funds and works with elite private equity firms like the Carlyle Group.
But it is not just another deep-pocketed investor hunting for high returns. It is the Providence Health System, one of the countrys largest and richest hospital chains. It is sitting on nearly $12 billion in cash, which it invests, Wall Street-style, in a good year generating more than $1 billion in profits.
And this spring, Providence received at least $509 million in government funds, one of many wealthy beneficiaries of a federal program that is supposed to prevent health care providers from capsizing during the coronavirus pandemic.
With states restricting hospitals from performing elective surgery and other nonessential services, their revenue has shriveled. The Department of Health and Human Services has disbursed $72 billion in grants since April to hospitals and other health care providers through the bailout program, which was part of the CARES Act economic stimulus package. The department plans to eventually distribute more than $100 billion more.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/25/business/coronavirus-hospitals-bailout.html
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dalton99a
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(4,950 posts)They have also furloughed nurses and other staff, decreased our staffing (higher number of patients to nurse ratios) even though we are reopening and have restarted electives (currently at 50% of previous elective surgery/procedure scheduling) and also have about 29 nursing home patients admitted (they are being moved to an area of the hospital that was previously closed down so will not be taking up previous acute care beds). There are a small number of Covid + patients admitted. There is no nursing shortage. These patients deserve better care. Nurses are calling in right and left to protest-- so they brought back the point system which was suspended in order to discourage people from coming in to work with symptoms and even the screening stations at the entrances are often unmanned.
I also found out that this Umbrella Corporation sold off a few non-performing hospitals to a horrible for profit company called Prime Healthcare Services in 2015. That company is known for hospital acquired infections, medicare fraud and inappropriate admissions from the ED (also closing down needed services like mental health). So there is a risk of that happening after they finish destroying everything that made my hospital a wonderful place for patients and employees. (High standards of evidence based care and supportive family like environment).
They keep whining about decrease revenue "lost money" yet they do have offshore accounts and a venture capital fund so can't be that sorry.