Stop the Cuts Now
Deep Cuts to Hospitals Are Hurting Us All.
Join the Fight to Protect the Health and Livelihood of Northeast Connecticut.
Day Kimball Healthcare and other hospitals and healthcare systems across Connecticut are facing significant challenges due to unprecedented cuts in Medicaid funding announced in September. That $192 million in cuts is on top of a four-year history of mounting state taxes to our non-profit hospital as well as significant previous reductions in state Medicaid funding and reimbursement rates (which are dead-last in the nation, covering not even half of the actual cost of providing care). If these cuts continue it will have disastrous effects for Northeast Connecticut - reduced access to local high quality healthcare for everyone, continued loss of health care jobs and a resulting significant impact on the local economy.
As legislators work to reconfigure the state budget, please join the fight and click here to tell them:
stop the cuts now >
What You Should Know: Additional Facts and History
- The recent slashing of $192 million in Medicaid funding from the Connecticut state budget adds to the already unsustainable hospital tax. It means that a grand total of $556 million – more than half a billion dollars each year – will not be used for healthcare.
- This is a tax on the sick, the vulnerable, and the institutions that care for them. It increases cost, reduces access, hurts our state and local economies, and is inconsistent with the goals of healthcare reform. One in five people are on Medicaid, including half of the children born in our state.
- It’s bad for our economy.
The hospital tax was originally imposed to bring more federal dollars to Connecticut, but now the state is leaving $373 million federal dollars on the table each year. That’s money that could be used to help people in Connecticut, and it’s going to other states instead. It makes no sense when Connecticut has a revenue problem. In most parts of the country, the healthcare sector is an economic engine that fosters job growth and fortifies local economies. But as hospital employment continues to increase nationally, Connecticut hospitals are shedding jobs. Connecticut is heading in the wrong direction. - It’s bad for healthcare.
Connecticut was already dead last in the nation for Medicaid reimbursement, and now providers are being paid less than half of what it costs to provide care – a mere 42 cents for a dollar of care. A $556 million tax results in an effective statewide tax rate of 85% on hospitals. This rate is 11 times higher than that imposed on any other Connecticut taxpayer. No taxpayer should be treated this way. Especially not hospitals, which employ more than 55,000 people and generate more than 110,000 jobs in our state. - These cuts and taxes are not reasonable or sustainable. It leaves our state’s neediest with less access to care and makes healthcare more expensive for everyone else.