Rep. Leanne Krueger Remarks – Holding Crozer Hospital Accountable
The following remarks were made at a news conference in Delaware County on Oct. 29, 2024
Rep. Leanne Krueger October 29, 2024
We are gathered here today to hold Prospect Medical Holdings accountable for the ways in which they have damaged the hospital system that so many Delaware County residents depend on, the Crozer Health system. We are gathered here to fight to save our healthcare. We are here to say no to their demands for hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to bailout a for-profit company. Prospect, a California-based hedge fund, has refused to pay their vendors, make their required pension payments for their employees and they have even taken out debt on the hospital system to pay their shareholders dividends and to make themselves richer.
Today we say no more. Back in February, the Delaware County Court of Common Please approved a plan to require Prospect to sell this system to a non-profit buyer within 270 days. That clock has run out and now we stand before this courthouse because litigation is the only way left to hold them accountable. The complaint filed by the Attorney General last night is an attempt to hold Prospect accountable for the closures that have already happened, but also an effort to fight to keep full services available at the other Prospect-held hospitals.
Crozer Chester Hospital stands in my district in Upland Borough. It holds the County’s only trauma center, burn unit, and the maternity caseload is growing due to closures in other parts of the County. It is open today, but Prospect has been threatening to close more services there just like they closed the Operating Room at Taylor Hospital and shut down Springfield and Delaware County Memorial Hospitals. Today we fight to stop them.
The nurses and doctors and paramedics and medical staff who work in these hospitals have stayed through extraordinarily difficult circumstances because they love their patients. I have lost count of the number of times a nurse or doctor has reached out to tell me that they don’t have the supplies they need because Prospect refused to pay their vendor bills, or that their caseloads were unmanageable because Prospect wasn’t willing to schedule enough nurses or doctors per shift.
Prospect has had eight long years to do the right thing, make the necessary infrastructure investments, pay their bills and treat their employees with respect. I have learned that private equity should not be allowed to run hospitals. The challenges we’re facing in Delco are not new – we have seen the same thing happen with hospitals run by Prospect in other states. They are being sued there too.
Today we stand together to stand up to corporate greed and to regain control of the hospitals that Delaware County families rely on.
Thank you.