As Steward’s loan agreement nears its April 30th deadline, a growing coalition of residents, healthcare workers, business, community, labor and faith-based organizations has come together to ensure the voice of the patients and communities are centered in decisions to protect care at nine hospitals. The coalition, Our Community | Our Hospital, is calling on elected officials and stakeholders to take appropriate steps to help avoid service reductions and hospital closures that would worsen health outcomes and create hospital deserts in the state.
The last of seven rallies and forums hosted by the Our Community Our Hospital coalition will be held at 3 p.m. on Monday, April 29th at Cunningham Park, which is located across the street from the St. Elizabeth’s Medical Center entrance (736 Cambridge St, Brighton).
Before this event, well-attended events were held in Taunton (home of Morton Hospital), Brockton (Good Samaritan Medical Center), Methuen and Haverhill (Holy Family Hospitals), Fall River (St. Anne’s Hospital) and Dorchester (Carney Hospital). The coalition is also finalizing plans for an event in Ayer, to call for the preservation of Nashoba Valley Medical Center.
The coalition has also launched an online petition to move public officials and stakeholders to secure new ownership of the Steward facilities… “to ensure the patients and families long-served by these institutions continue to have access to the care and services they provide for generations to come”
The Our Community/Our Hospital petition makes clear what is at stake with the potential closure of these facilities and the need for all involved to preserve them, stating “the loss of any of these facilities will deliver a devastating blow to the entire health care infrastructure in the Commonwealth, particularly to some of the most vulnerable and marginalized patients and families who will be subject to dangerous delays in care, be forced to travel longer distances for care, and for many, to go without care altogether… the critical task now is for all stakeholders and policymakers to come together to secure new ownership of the Steward facilities and to create appropriate processes and oversight to ensure a safer, more equitable not-for-profit healthcare system that places a concern for the public’s health over private wealth.”
More than 200,000 residents from the Merrimack Valley to the South Coast are served by nine hospitals currently owned by Steward Healthcare including St. Elizabeth’s in Brighton, Carney Hospital in Dorchester, Good Samaritan Medical Center in Brockton, Holy Family Hospital in Methuen and Haverhill Hospital in Haverhill, Morton Hospital in Taunton, Nashoba Valley Medical Center in Ayer, Norwood Hospital in Norwood, and St. Anne’s Hospital in Fall River. These hospitals are among the largest employers in our communities, with more than 16,000 workers and caregivers, who not only safeguard care, but also contribute to the economic health of our small businesses, cities, and towns.
