Hospital emergency room entrance sign. (File photo from States Newsroom.)
A recent analysis shows that ten safety-net hospitals in Ohio are at risk of closing due to health care cuts under the Republican spending bill signed by President Donald Trump last summer.
Law too reduced taxes on the richest 1% of Americans by $1 trillion. Ohio Republican Sen. Jon Husted, who voted for the measure, declined to comment.
Trump’s One Big Beautiful Act cuts nearly $1 trillion from Medicaid over 10 years, and these cuts threaten to close 446 safety net hospitals across the country, he said report by Public Citizen.
“The cuts will be devastating to many low-income people and people with disabilities who rely on Medicaid,” the report says.
“Moreover, they will have a knock-on effect on hospitals that disproportionately serve these communities, exacerbating the financial burdens that already plague rural and safety-net hospitals and worsening their ability to provide care, potentially leading to many of them closing.”
Before the Trump bill passed, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that cuts to Medicaid i loss of tax benefits in Affordable Care Act markets it will cost 16 million Americans their health insurance.
These people will continue to get infirmed, and hospitals will have to cover at least some of their care. This is this is especially true in emergency departmentsthat must accept people regardless of their ability to pay.
Since a enormous part of the mission of safety-net hospitals is to care for Medicaid beneficiaries and the uninsured, it stands to reason that they will be the most affected by the cuts.
The Public Citizen report indicated that 60% of at-risk hospitals are in urban areas and 39% are in rural areas.
In Ohio, the hospitals most at risk are:
- Greene Memorial Hospital in Xenia
- Mary Rutan Hospital in Bellefontaine
- Coshocton Regional Medical Center in Coshocton
- Twin City Hospital in Denison
- Mercy Regional Medical Center in Lorain
- Marymount Hospital in Garfield Heights
- South Pointe Hospital in Warrensville Heights
- Lake Health Beachwood Medical Center in Beechwood
- Euclid’s Hospital in Euclid
- UH Conneaut Medical Center in Conneaut
Hospitals made the list if at least 20% of their payers were made up of Medicaid and other low-income patients — and if they lost money between 2022 and 2024.
“The list of at-risk hospitals is descriptive, not predictive; it does not include a prediction that these hospitals will close, but rather identifies the hospitals most at financial risk from severe cuts to Medicaid,” the report said.
Husted’s office did not respond to a request for comment on the analysis.
Former Ohio State Sen. Sherrod Brown, the Democrat challenging Husted in November, sharply criticized Husted for his vote to cut Medicaid. He also criticized Husted’s votes not to expand subsidies in markets covered by the Affordable Care Act.
(*10*) Brown wrote in an email.
“Working families across Ohio are holding their breath as their premiums skyrocket and they know it won’t come from Jon Husted. Ohioans deserve a senator who fights to lower costs. Jon Husted is failing them at every turn.”
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