A HOSPITAL’S LEGACY
Chris Pomorski did an extraordinary job of describing how the investor-led, misguided leadership of Hahnemann University Hospital hastened its shutdown and disrupted the lives of patients, staff, medical residents, and students (“Death of a Hospital,” June 7th). As Pomorski highlights, hospitals—even those with nonprofit status—have become businesses. The demise of Hahnemann thus illuminates a larger issue: the patchwork approach to delivering health care in the U.S. is inadequate. All developed countries face challenges in paying for health care, but most have made access to it a right, and have instituted systemic approaches to funding and managing it in order to insure that access. Hahnemann failed, in part, because the majority of its patients were enrolled in Medicaid and Medicare, which pay less than private insurers. Should hospitals and…
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The New Yorker (Digital) - 1 Issue, June 28, 2021