Hospitals Brace for Another Round of Severe Budget Cuts
State Medi-Cal Cuts Put More Code Blue Financial Pressures on Hospitals
On July 1, hospitals will face a severe 10 percent cut to many of the Medi-Cal programs that provide coverage to nearly 6.7 million low-income and disabled Californians. The cuts, which were signed into law by the governor in February 2008, represent a $500 million loss to hospitals and will severely impact a wide range of services. California's most vulnerable — the uninsured, underinsured and disabled — will have even less access to care!
The stakes are high. The latest round of cuts may also cause rural hospitals to reduce or suspend critical services or close their doors altogether. The surviving hospital emergency rooms will be in a critical condition with more patients, longer wait times and more financial pressures.
Please share CHA's Code Blue advocacy message with legislators and other elected officials, community leaders, opinion leaders and hospital employees. Let them know that the health care crisis in California could become much worse!
To help inform these external and internal stakeholders, CHA encourages you to share with them:
- A new two-minute video on the widespread impact of the Medi-Cal cuts.
- The specific impact of the cuts on your hospital — using newsletter template articles CHA has developed. To request these templates, please contact Code Blue at pa@calhospital.org.
California's Community Hospitals at Financial Risk
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