COVID-19 and hospital bankruptcies

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Source: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/sale-...124255190.html

For Sale: Bankrupt Hospitals in America’s Heartland
[Bloomberg]
Jeremy Hill
BloombergApril 30, 2020

Bloomberg) -- Bankrupt hospital group Americore Holdings LLC was in a precarious spot before the coronavirus ripped through America’s heartland. Now, thanks in part to federal aid, it’s looking for buyers.

The group is seeking bids on St. Alexius Hospital in St. Louis, Ellwood City Medical Center near Pittsburgh and Izard County Medical Center in Arkansas, according to bankruptcy court papers. With the U.S. economy at a virtual standstill since the pandemic spread, it’s a tough time to sell anything, let alone a hospital. But the Americore facilities are drawing some interest -- six potential buyers had signed non-disclosure agreements as of April 21, the papers show...

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Source: https://bangordailynews.com/2020/04/...ruptcy-itself/

A firm that employs doctors at 2 bankrupt Maine hospitals may seek bankruptcy itself
By Charles Eichacker, BDN Staff • April 30, 2020 1:00 am
Updated: April 30, 2020 10:54 am

A staffing firm that employs some of the doctors in three rural Maine hospitals — including two that are now in bankruptcy and suing the federal government for stimulus funding — is reportedly considering filing for bankruptcy itself as a result of steep revenue shortfalls related to the coronavirus.

Just as those hospitals have lost considerable revenue after preparing to handle the pandemic, Envision Healthcare Corp. is struggling to pay off $7 billion in debt after the crisis forced medical systems all across the U.S. to delay lucrative elective services, according to Bloomberg...

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Source: https://www.mainebiz.biz/article/cal...al-woes-deepen

Calais Regional Hospital cuts 10% of its workforce as financial woes deepen
By William Hall

Calais Regional Hospital is cutting its workforce by 10% as the coronavirus crisis aggravates the hospital’s shaky financial position.

The 25-bed critical-access facility, which is seeking Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, will eliminate roughly 20 jobs through layoffs and attrition, effective Friday, a spokeswoman told Mainebiz.

Vice President of Community Relations DeeDee Travis said the pandemic has made the hospital’s bad situation worse — and that federal relief funding has been of little help...

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Source: https://www.timesunion.com/news/arti...s-15234023.php

Waiting for aid, upstate hospitals are losing over $250,000 a day
Emilie Munson
April 29, 2020
Updated: April 29, 2020 8:06 p.m.

WASHINGTON — Many New York hospitals have been plunged into deficits and left to navigate a confusing and opaque federal aid system after their elective surgery businesses were shut down as thousands of people afflicted with COVID-19 flooded emergency rooms and intensive care units.

In April, the federal government sent $1.4 billion to support New York hospitals overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic. An additional $4.4 billion is expected to flow to state hospitals in virus “hot spots” this week, Senate Democratic Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., said...

[sharon sanders]

If people wonder why hospitals would have a hard financial time when the costs for COVID-19 treatment are being covered by private insurance, medicaid, and medicare - it is because all other procedures are being delayed. Most states have had a ban on elective procedures since early this year. Many people, afraid of COVID-19, are postponing doctor's appointments and treatments. In some cases even cancer patients are delaying treatments.

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Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...es/2996521001/

Coronavirus strains cash-strapped hospitals, could cause up to 100 to close within a year
Josh Salman and Jayme Fraser
USA TODAY NETWORK

For years, Lallie Kemp Regional Medical Center has spiraled further into the red.

The 24-bed charity hospital in Louisiana’s small town of Independence lost more than $15 million in 2016 and $19 million in 2017, the latest public data available. Those losses represent nearly a third of the hospital’s total gross revenue.

Then coronavirus rocked Tangipahoa Parish, where Lallie Kemp scrambles to help treat the community’s hundreds of confirmed COVID-19 patients – many of whom are indigent and unable to pay or rely on Medicaid, which pays hospitals less than private insurance.

After the government restricted elective procedures – one of the rural hospital’s primary moneymakers – the pandemic erased $1.3 million in expected revenue. If the quarantines continue through May, that could swell to nearly $3 million.

“We don’t have any profit margin to speak of, so it will be a direct loss,” said Chad Thompson, the hospital’s chief financial officer. “And we don’t know how long this will last.”

In rural communities across America, more than 800 hospitals faced financial peril before the pandemic took hold. Now, they must find a way to treat thousands of coronavirus patients, which could trigger a financial cascade that sinks up to a hundred hospitals within the next year.

A USA TODAY Network analysis of financial reports submitted to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services found that almost half of the counties with coronavirus cases are served by a hospital that reported a net loss in 2017.

In communities served by 640 of these struggling medical centers, there is no other hospital in town. Nearly all of those in jeopardy are in rural counties.

As the virus spreads into rural America, sometimes weeks after urban hot spots, many small hospitals must wrestle with the choice of laying off longtime staff members or buying lifesaving supplies for clinicians.

“You have a vulnerable population for COVID, and we see a situation where many of these rural hospitals won’t be able to survive the pandemic,” said Maggie Elehwany, head of government affairs for the National Rural Health Association...

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Source: https://www.tahlequahdailypress.com/...c595dc937.html


This Oklahoma hospital has only 8 nurses left. They double as the janitors.
By Brianna Bailey | The Frontier Apr 26, 2020

Andrea Randall, a nurse who also serves as the interim administrator of Haskell County Community Hospital in Stigler says she’s been praying for a new owner to take over and “help bring us back to life.”
Nick Oxford for ProPublica

Eight nurses at the lone hospital in the rural Oklahoma town of Stigler now double as the cleaning crew. They stabilize patients with life-threatening conditions, mop floors and scrub toilets.

The nurses, along with an office manager and a part-time maintenance worker, are the only remaining employees at the Haskell County Community Hospital, which two years ago had a staff of 68 and provided some of the highest-paying jobs in the southeastern Oklahoma town.

Andrea Randall, a nurse who also serves as the hospital’s interim administrator, has watched it claw through years of financial turmoil in the decade since she started working. None, she said, have been as difficult as the past two years...

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Source: https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-he...-without-cases

Rural Michigan hospitals gutted by coronavirus, even those without cases
Posted on: April 23, 2020Written by:Ted RoelofsTopic:Michigan Health Watch

Just like many urban hospitals in Michigan, the bottom line at Chippewa County War Memorial Hospital in Sault Ste. Marie has been slammed by COVID-19.

With a statewide hold on “non-essential” procedures by a March 10 executive order of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, revenues plunged by $4 million in a month at the Upper Peninsula hospital. It laid off 140 of 900 workers...