It is starting
What you ask? The decline of our health-care system.
From the Knoxville, Tennessee
News Sentinel
New downtown Knoxville Mercy hospital shelved
Mercy Health Partners said Thursday it has shelved plans to build a new downtown hospital because of the economy and uncertainty over the national health care debate.
The unanimous decision made by Mercy's board of directors comes a year after the health system announced that it would build a $400 million replacement facility on the site of the former Baptist Hospital of East Tennessee if certain financial benchmarks were met.
"The economy has put us in a position where we can't do it," said Jerry Askew, senior vice president of external affairs for Mercy Health.
And more:
Last year, Mercy provided more than $129 million in uncompensated care to the poor, uninsured and underinsured.
In addition to the economy, hospital officials also cited "the unpredictability of the national health care policy debate."
The Obama administration has announced its intention to enact sweeping health care reform this year.
"The only certainty is that reimbursements for Medicare and Medicaid are going to go down," Askew said.
$129 Million is not chump change - Knoxville has a
population of around 180K people so this is about $700 per person. They have over ten hospitals (same source) so are well served medically.
For Mercy Health Partners to decide not to build, there must be some powerful writing on the wall.
Jen and I disagree on the subject of government health care. She things that
something must be done. I think that
the right thing must be done and Obama is
most assuredly not doing the right thing.
Posted by DaveH at June 13, 2009 1:22 PM