Two major health care institutions in Brooklyn are on the brink of bankruptcy and closure any day now: Long Island College Hospital in Cobble Hill, and Interfaith Medical Center in Bedford-Stuyvesant. Both these facilities are vital pillars of their respective communities, serving large numbers of uninsured and low-income people on public insurance programs like Medicaid, Family Health Plus, and Child Health Plus.
Unfortunately, pleas to state officials for help, made by the local communities and their elected officials, the unions representing workers at these hospitals, and the hospitals’ boards and executives, have all fallen on deaf ears in Albany, and court orders to keep them open and operating are also being ignored by state officials.
On July 24, all the various forces working hard to keep these hospitals open held a New Orleans-style funeral march across the Brooklyn Bridge (a tried-and-true NYC political tradition), followed by a rally in Lower Manhattan.
By way of some background…. The crisis at both these medical facilities is part of a larger health care crisis in northern and central Brooklyn, a part of our city that is predominantly comprised of various immigrant communities and communities of color. These communities have been neglected and chronically underfunded for many years running now when it comes to health care. Meanwhile, other well-resourced, politically-influential, and market-dominating health care institutions located in more-affluent areas of our city have all too often garnered the lion’s share of limited public resources. Unfortunately, this dynamic is all too common across our city. We urge Governor Cuomo, Mayor Bloomberg, and members of the State Legislature and City Council to immediate rectify this situation. We also call on all candidates running for public office in this year’s municipal elections to address this crisis when speaking to voters.