Massachusetts Rep. Lynch says Steward Health Care wants to abandon plans to re-open Norwood Hospital
NORWOOD - Massachusetts Congressman Stephen Lynch said Steward Health Care wants to abandon plans to re-open Norwood Hospital.
The hospital has been closed since it flooded in June 2020 when nearly six inches of rain fell in just a few hours. A new facility was being built on the same property, but construction stopped recently. According to the Boston Globe, contractors have not been paid.
"They're sort of in a holding pattern right now," Lynch told reporters at a news conference at the site Wednesday. There has been no comment yet from Steward on the Norwood Hospital construction.
Lynch toured the site and another Steward hospital, Good Samaritan Medical Center in Brockton, a day after Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey told Steward to essentially get out of the hospital business in the state.
Steward Health Care is millions of dollars in debt and the future of all ten of its hospitals in Massachusetts are in doubt.
Lynch agreed with Healey's demand that Steward CEO Ralph de la Torre come up with documents laying out Steward's finances by Friday, to prove the hospitals are properly staffed and open to monitoring.
The state is trying to come up with a rescue plan to sell each facility or allow another health care system to take over, but the Healey Administration said the for-profit hospital group isn't cooperating.
"Those talks are happening, but they are equally hampered by this incomplete information about the debt structure," Health and Human Services Secretary Kate Walsh said Wednesday.
Lynch said he was first told about the Steward crisis about a month ago.
"We got word from them when they were $50 million behind on their rent," he told reporters. "We need to get complete transparency from Steward Health Care about their finances, about their plans."