Dive Brief:
- Connecticut hospitals say they are likely to have to cut staff and services if the state's trimmed-back budget is signed into law by Governor Dannel Malloy.
- The new budget reduces Medicaid payments and increases taxes for the majority of services they provide.
- The Connecticut Hospital Association predicts a rash of layoffs and suggests the first such announcement—Hartford Healthcare recently said it would be forced to cut 400 people—is just the tip of the iceberg.
Dive Insight:
Hospital officials argue that the budget would be detrimental to their operations.
"What we're seeing play out is exactly what we anticipated when we saw the damaging effects of the budget that was passed," said Connecticut Hospital Association CEO Jennifer Jackson in an interview with NBC. "The increase in taxes and the cuts to hospitals, that was devastating."
Meanwhile, the governor says the state has done its part to help hospitals in recent years. In addition, some Democratic lawmakers are suggesting that hospitals are using the budget as a scapegoat for their downsizing decisions and are criticizing the continued high salaries hospital CEOs, of which some are in the millions.