Local hospitals seek lifeline

EL CENTRO – As Imperial County’s hospitals deal with a recent surge in COVID-19 cases, they’re also reeling from crippling revenue losses and mounting expenses linked to treating and mitigating the disease.

The chief executives of both Pioneers Memorial Healthcare District and El Centro Regional Medical Center joined Carmela Coyle, president and CEO of the California Hospital Association in a press teleconference Wednesday morning to address these financial pressures and to make an appeal to the state for assistance.

Coyle opened the conference call with a prepared statement in which she noted the state’s hospitals “answered the call, as always” in stepping up to deal with COVID-19.

She said that when

Gov. Gavin Newsom asked them to prepare for, first, a 40 percent surge and, eventually, a 50 percent surge in COVID-19 patients, “California’s hospitals did just that. We were asked to meet that moment, and we did so, and we did so proudly. We emptied California’s hospitals to make way. That meant canceling surgeries and procedures and more. And we did that because it is what hospitals do. It is the right thing.”

But these accommodations have come at a steep price. Coyle said emergency room visits across the state are down 50 percent. Revenue losses for California hospitals overall are running 20 percent to 30 percent, while many rural hospitals are experiencing drops closer to 50 percent to 60 percent.

All of that translates into short-term revenue losses of $10 billion to $14 billion statewide, she said.

That does not take into account increased expenses hospitals have incurred in preparing for the pandemic, she added. These include construction; equipment purchases, such as personal protective equipment; setting up alternative care sites, and more.

“This immediate and significant loss of revenue really does drain the financial strength of hospitals, not just our immediate liquidity, but the ability of hospitals to borrow and the ability for them to undertake capital projects moving ahead in the future,” she said.

For Pioneers Memorial Healthcare District, which already had been experiencing mounting losses in recent years, the pandemic has been a financial cliff. CEO Larry Lewis reported that the hospital immediately canceled about 65 percent of its scheduled surgeries when the pandemic began. The loss of these high-dollar services, in addition to a 40 percent decline to emergency room visits and a 50 percent drop in visits to the district’s specialty clinics, netted a $5 million loss in collectible revenues for the month of April alone.

“That’s almost 50 percent,” he said. If those trends were to continue and no relief becomes available, “we really would only last about three to five months, at best,” he said.

ECRMC CEO Dr. Adolphe Edward painted a similarly stark picture. Lost revenues at the hospital are currently running $6 million a month, he said. Meanwhile, investments in PPE and other accommodations to prepare for COVID patients have pushed up costs by about $2.5 million.

“As Larry (Lewis) pointed out, if we do not see advancements with some of the federal support dollars that are, of course, augmented at the state level, it’s going to be very hard to continue that trajectory,” Edward said, “not only just into the next fiscal year that starts in July, but the next calendar year that starts in January, (especially) if we

see another surge (in COVID-19 cases) that is expected in October and November.”

Coyle said CHA and its member hospitals are seeking “an immediate lifeline” in form of state financial support. First, she said, the trade organization is asking the governor and the Legislature for an immediate cash injection of $1 billion into the state’s hospitals before the end of the current fiscal year on June 30.

The second request was less specific: “We are asking this governor and this Legislature for a united commitment in the coming budget year that begins July 1 to call for more federal matching aid, for the state to provide some dollars that would then be matched by the federal government,” Coyle said.

Coyle issued a letter

Wednesday in support of U.S. House Resolution 6800, also known as the HEROES Act. “As we have watched the first few allocations from the provider relief fund, we are disappointed that on a per capita basis, California ranks near the bottom of dollars received and note that several states at the top of that list have seen very few COVID patients,” the letter said. “A different allocation is clearly needed, and we are pleased to see such efforts in the HEROES Act. The HEROES Act will increase and more fairly distribute federal funds to directly reimburse the costs of preparing for the pandemic and recognize the billions of dollars health care providers are losing as they have drastically reduced services.”

The Democrat-spon

sored bill includes a $100 billion infusion to help hospitals and healthcare providers cover costs, as well as additional help for hospitals serving low-income communities.

Republicans have been characterized as cool on the bill. “What Nancy Pelosi is proposing will never pass the Senate,” Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyoming, has been quoted as saying.

The state’s hospitals are looking for a change of heart. “As our state works to climb out from the economic and societal devastation wrought by COVID-19, it is vital that its hospitals – and the health care safety net they provide – are secure,” Coyle said in her letter. “We cannot reignite our state’s economy, the largest in the nation, without this critical health care safety net.”