BOSTON (WHDH) - Employees gathered Monday morning to protest the planned closure of Carney Hospital in Dorchester, criticizing hospital owner Steward Health Care and calling on state officials to take action.
The protest came 10 days after Steward announced plans to close Carney and Nashoba Valley Medical Center in Ayer. The protest also followed more recent news that Steward plans to lay off staff at both hospitals as it shutters those facilities.
By 9 a.m. Monday, dozens of people were massing outside Carney Hospital’s emergency room with signs and a bullhorn.
“Keep Carney Hospital open,” read several signs.
“It’s devastating,” said Carney hospital patient Robert La Rosa. “All my doctors are here.”
Financial troubles at Steward led to a bankruptcy filing earlier this year and touched off wide-ranging criticism from hospital employees, their union representatives, patients, and public officials alike.
Steward operates eight hospitals in Massachusetts and announced plans to sell all its hospitals after it filed for bankruptcy. Late last month, Steward said it was in talks to finalize the sale of six hospitals. After receiving no qualified bids for Carney or Nashoba, though, Steward said it would close those facilities at the end of August.
Though leaders have condemned Steward and the decisions they say led to the company’s bankruptcy, some state legislators and representatives of the Massachusetts Nurses Association have said the state should be doing more.
“For the residents of the Commonwealth, no community is expendable, and all deserve our protection,” the nurses association said in a statement.
“Our state leaders, along with all stakeholders in this crisis have a pivotal choice to make in the crucial days that follow: we can sit back and allow a corrupt corporation and a limited bankruptcy process to dictate our fate and facilitate an unprecedented public health disaster, or we can all work together, utilizing all of our resources and the tools at our disposal to take back control of our health care system for the good of all,” the nurses association continued.
Gov. Maura Healey last week said she is pushing Steward to comply with a state law that requires hospitals to notify state regulators at least 120 days before any proposed hospital closure.
Nurses association leaders said they were “pleased to learn” about Healey’s statement. Moving forward, leaders called on Attorney General Andrea Campbell to enforce the 120-day notice requirement.
The nurses association said Healey and local mayors should declare a public health emergency and use emergency powers to prevent hospital closures.
Among other options, the nurses association said state legislative leaders should draw on a state “rainy day” fund to keep hospitals open.
“This hospital is one of the oldest hospitals. It was started as a charity and it should remain a charity,” said Carney nurse practitioner Stephen Wood on Monday.
“We provide probably one of the most important services for these marginalized communities in Dorchester, Roxbury, Mattapan, Quincy,” he continued. “People come from all over because they know the care here is great and we’re going to do the right thing for them.”
Wood said 70% of Carney’s patients are on Medicaid.
“There are no other places that take those patients that care as much as we do about those patients,” he said.
“It’s imperative that we continue to serve this community,” he continued.
La Rosa, who currently travels from Braintree to receive care at Carney, said the service and people at the hospital are “tremendous.”
Asked what he will do if Carney closes, he responded — “I have no idea.”
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