The Delaware Valley Healthcare Council of HAP today issued the following statement from regional executive Kenneth J. Braithwaite in response to Governor Ed Rendell’s proposed 2010-2011 state budget:
“As Pennsylvania develops its state budget, hospitals must have the resources to care for their most vulnerable patients without undermining their overall ability to continue to be among the region’s largest, most reliable employers.
“Hospitals and health systems in southeastern Pennsylvania greatly contribute to the region’s overall stability. In addition to assuring access to care for growing numbers of uninsured and under-insured, hospitals support 11 percent of the region’s employment and provide much needed economic stimulus.
“At a time when the region’s unemployment and enrollment in government-sponsored Medical Assistance insurance are the highest in several decades, the hospital safety net must be supported.”
Five of the ten largest employers in Greater Philadelphia are hospitals. Hospitals rank among the top five largest private-sector employers for Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery, and Philadelphia Counties.
According to a recent Philadelphia Business Journal survey of the region’s 50 largest employers, health care accounted for nearly 60 percent of the 6,000 jobs expected to be filled in the next six months.
Continued high unemployment and growing Medical Assistance enrollment make it essential that the state budget contain funding to at least hold steady hospital reimbursements for services provided to patients with Medical Assistance. As of December 2009, southeastern Pennsylvania’s unemployment rate was 8.2 percent. In the five-county region during fiscal year 2009:
- Unemployment increased 60 percent from 5 to 8 percent.
- Medical Assistance enrollment grew nearly 10 percent – about three times the average annual rate during the previous four years – with hospitals being reimbursed on average just 82 percent of the cost of care provided to patients with Medical Assistance.
- Hospital emergency rooms, used with greater frequency by the un- and under-insured, saw volumes increase 7.6 percent from 156,750 visits in June 2008 to 168,730 in June 2009.
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