Kerby Anderson

Many hospitals in America seem headed for bankruptcy. How could this be, given the need for clinics and hospitals to fight the virus pandemic? The reason is simple. The CDC recommended that health-care providers postpone “elective” procedures in order to have the needed capacity to treat COVID-19 patients. If you needed a knee replacement, you had to wait. Everything from hernia repairs to colonoscopies were delayed. Some doctors even paused chemotherapy for less aggressive cancers in order to avoid exposing their patients with suppressed immune systems to the virus. There’s just one problem. Hospitals and doctors make most of their income from these elective procedures that the CDC recommended they postpone. The Wall Street Journal reports that hospitals and physicians are now hemorrhaging cash. That revenue stream has dried up for now. In addition to the financial cost is the medical cost of suspending care. Preventive screenings (mammograms and colonoscopies) have been cancelled. Cancers that would have been found go undetected. Chronic conditions can get worse because regular check-ups have been postponed. We may be moving quickly toward telemedicine, but many important diagnoses must take place in person. Over the next few weeks, we will be hearing about hospitals filing for bankruptcy and health-care workers being fired or furloughed. It may seem hard to believe that the doctors, nurses, and medical personnel that we depended on these many weeks will now lose their jobs because of the CDC recommendation. We have been praising these health-care workers for their stamina and perseverance in the midst of this pandemic. Unfortunately, we may end up rewarding many of them with a pink slip.