One fact has become clear in reporting the closure of the Nashoba Valley Medical Center: Steward Health Care and the commonwealth are creating an unfunded mandate by leaving towns in the abandoned hospital’s service area to deal with its consequences.
Emergency medical services throughout the region must find ways to transport patients with life-threatening conditions or injuries to more distant and overcrowded emergency rooms at Emerson in Concord and UMass Memorial in Leominster. Wear and tear on emergency vehicles will double or triple, and more vehicles and staff may be necessary to deal with longer transport times. Social services, especially town councils on aging, will be affected, as this week’s story in the Press explains. And given the experience of the past week, it’s clear that remaining emergency rooms in the region need more beds and staff.
Adjusting to these changes will take money not currently available in fiscal 2025. To expect towns and their taxpayers to pick up the tab for a disaster that is not their fault would add insult to injury. It’s clear that Steward has no intention or ability to pay for a reconfiguration of the North Central Massachusetts health care system. It seems only proper that the governor and Legislature do so.
After all, Gov. Maura Healey has already promised to provide $30 million to help Steward transfer five of its hospitals to new owners: Good Samaritan Hospital in Brockton, Morton Hospital in Taunton, St. Anne’s Hospital in Fall River, Holy Family’s Haverhill and Methuen campuses, and St. Elizabeth’s Medical Center in Brighton are all in the process of being purchased in a deal expected to be concluded Sept 4. There are reports that leaders of the House and Senate are prepared to make as much as $700 million available to the new owners over three years to refurbish and properly equip those institutions.
We urge Gov. Healey and the Legislature to do the same for health care in North Central Massachusetts by providing grants to area towns to upgrade their emergency medical and social services and to hospitals to expand existing facilities.
And we encourage the state not to overlook the soon-to-be abandoned Nashoba Valley Medical Center, which has served the area for 60 years. An offer of money to the operators rumored to be interested in reviving the facility could be the spark necessary to create the health center that residents in this part of the state need and deserve.
