Lawmakers vowed to file a contempt cost in opposition to embattled Steward Health CEO Ralph de la Torre after he skipped a subpoena to seem earlier than a U.S. Senate committee listening to into the chain’s chapter.
“Workers have lost their jobs,” Sen. Ed Markey stated following the Senate Health, Training, Labor and Pensions (HELP) listening to Thursday. “Communities have lost their hospitals. Patients have died, all because of Ralph de la Torre and his unending greed.
“But instead of answers from him today, we got an empty chair,” Markey continued. “So since Ralph de la Torre has shown only contempt for our health care system, its patients and workers, the United States Senate must hold him in contempt.”
The HELP Committee, chaired by Sen. Bernie Sanders, voted to open an investigation into the Steward Health chapter in July and subpoena the CEO to testify earlier than the committee.
Steward declared chapter in Could and is presently promoting six Massachusetts hospitals. Two extra, Carney Hospital in Dorchester and Nashoba Valley Medical Heart in Ayer, had been closed in late August.
Markey stated the committee will vote on a bipartisan “civil and criminal” contempt quotation in opposition to de la Torre subsequent week.
“He will appear before our committee,” Markey acknowledged, flanked by healthcare professionals from a number of Steward services. “He will answer. He will be accountable to all of these stakeholders.”
Markey famous the trouble is “historic,” because the subpoena and contempt quotation are the primary to come back out of the committee in 4 a long time.
An legal professional for de la Torre stated the CEO wouldn’t testify on Sept. 4. The lawyer requested the listening to be postponed till after the corporate’s chapter proceedings concluded, noting that Steward was prohibiting de la Torre from talking on the corporate’s behalf relating to any “bankruptcy-related issues.”
“On June 25, Chair Sanders and I asked Steward’s CEO to testify before the committee,” stated Sen. Invoice Cassidy. “He refused without further discussion and did not counter with another date. He did not offer another company official. To be clear, the committee would have been open to working with Steward to ensure cooperation. They ended the negotiation before it started.”
Markey cited his just lately launched report highlighting the influence of Steward’s monetary mismanagement, together with a rise in sufferers turned away from emergency departments, larger demise charges for sure situations in comparison with different hospitals, and rather more.
In a single instance of lethal penalties at a Steward hospital in Massachusetts, Cassidy stated, medical doctors realized mid-surgery provides wanted to deal with a girl who’d simply given beginning had been repossessed and she or he died.
“I personally would like to hear from Dr. de la Torre how he made these decisions to siphon off so many services,” stated Ellana Stinson, a health care provider with the New England Medical Affiliation who previously labored at Carney and Quincy hospitals. “I really want to know how he’s able, as a fellow physician, to be okay with causing so much harm to patients, to their families, and the communities, and also how he’s able to cause so much harm to his call his fellow physicians as well. His decisions will forever leave a devastating impact on these communities.”
Kevin Wolf/ The Related Press
The chair reserved for Steward Health Care System CEO Ralph de la Torre sits empty throughout yesterday’s Senate Health, Training, Labor, and Pensions listening to. (AP Picture/Kevin Wolf)
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