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YNHH CEO Marna Borgrstrom
Yale New Haven Health could face an operating loss of upwards of $500 million this fiscal year — a roughly $750 million swing from the regional health care system’s rosier, pre-pandemic budget projections.
Also, the city and YNHH have teamed up to open a new Covid-19 testing site at the former Strong School on Orchard Street.
YNHH President and CEO Marna Borgstrom shared that dire financial forecast Wednesday morning during YNHH’s weekly coronavirus-related virtual town hall. The meeting was the ninth such question-and-answer session with reporters that YNHH has hosted since the start of the pandemic in mid-March. It took place on Zoom and on Facebook Life.
In an email press release sent out later Wednesday afternoon, Mayor Justin Elicker confirmed what Borgstrom and YNHH Senior Vice President Vin Petrini hinted at during the morning presser: That YNHH and the city will open a new coronavirus testing site at the former Strong School location at 130 Orchard St.
That new site will replace YNHH’s existing drive through testing site at 150 Sargent Dr. on Long Wharf. (See more below.)
When asked about the roughly $200 million in Covid-19 federal aid that the regional health system has received so far, including over $114 million for the system’s two New Haven hospital campuses, Borgstrom said that YNHH’s overall finances remain an “evolving picture.”
Before the start of the pandemic, she said, YNHH projected a $250 million operating surplus for the fiscal year that ends Sept. 30.
More recently, “we were expecting to see at minimum a $300 million swing,” meaning that the hospital could face a $52 million to $55 million loss.
“That number is now growing,” she continued. “I think that it is quite likely, quite possible, that that number will be a $750 million swing and that we will end up with a $500 million operating loss without expense mitigation.”
She said the pandemic has led to a precipitous loss in revenue because of the hospital system’s two-month pause on elective procedures. It has also led to significant increased costs associated with creating more intensive care unit (ICU) beds for Covid-sick patients, acquiring adequate supplies of personal protective equipment for staff, and ramping up testing for patients, staff, and members of the public alike.
Borgstrom was asked about Tuesday night’s budget vote during which the alders called on Yale and YNHH to increase their voluntary payments to the city by $2.5 million in the coming fiscal year. Borgstrom and Petrini pointed to the hospital’s support financial support of New Haven Promise, its status as one of the largest employers in the city, the $300 million in taxes that it paid the state last year, and its $2.8 million annual voluntary contribution to the city.
“Yale New Haven Health remains the largest taxpayer in the State of Connecticut overall,” said Petrini.
“The challenge for all of us is going to be to figure out how to be creative about how to build our work again and how to build our budgets to support not just what we used to do, but what we need to do going forward,” added Borgstrom.
In 2018, YNHH as a system, which includes seven hospital campuses in Connecticut and Rhode Island, brought in net revenue of $4.6 billion. Yale New Haven Hospital, which consists of the main York Street hospital and the St. Raphael’s Campus, had an operating surplus of $245.7 million that same year.
Strong School Testing Site Coming Soon
YNHH Senior Vice President Vin Petrini
Other updates included:
Elicker confirmed in a separate email press release that the city and YNHH plan to open a new Covid-19 testing site at the former Strong School at 130 Orchard St. in the Hill neighborhood. The site is owned by the city and managed by New Haven Public Schools.
Petrini and Elicker both said that the new testing site will replace YNHH’s current 150 Sargent Dr. testing location. That will allow for YNHH to begin construction of its planned new primary care hub at that site, which it will run in collaboration with Fair Haven Community Health Care and Cornell Scott Hill Health Center.
Petrini and YNHH Chief Clinical Officer Thomas Balcezak said that the new testing site, just like the current Long Wharf testing site, will require people interested in receiving a test to to get a doctor’s note first.
“We want to make sure that folks that have symptoms get preference there,” Balcezak said about why YNHH, for now, will continue to require doctor’s notes at its local testing location. He said that the hospital doesn’t currently have “an excess capacity of testing,” and doesn’t want to overwhelm its own labs or testing kit supplies.
He said that anyone interested in receiving a doctor’s note can call YNHH’s Covid-19 hotline at 833-ASK-YNHH (833 – 275-9644).
Requiring doctor’s notes and reserving tests for the symptomatic runs counter to the message that Elicker, city Health Director Maritza Bond, and U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal promoted just the day before as they announced that the city is encouraging all New Haveners — regardless of whether or not they are sick — to get tested.
“In addition to this site, the City is supporting many other sites for testing, particularly concentrated in neighborhoods of need,” Elicker is quoted as saying in Wednesday’s email press release. “I want to reiterate that the City is offering symptomatic, asymptomatic, and antibody testing for COVID-19. If you need more information or need assistance getting tested, please call the New Haven Health Department at (203) 946‑4949 or visit the City’s COVID-19 website.”
Petrini said that YNHH will not close down its Long Wharf testing site until the Strong School site is up and running. He said that should be in early June.
2 YNHH Employee Covid-Related Fatalities
YNHH Chief Clinical Officer Thomas Balcezak.
Borgstrom said that the hospital system continues to see a steady decline in its number of Covid-19 inpatients.
Yale New Haven Hospital currently has 182 coronavirus-positive inpatients, she said. That number is down from a peak of 472 in late April.
Greenwich Hospital currently has around 20 positive inpatients, and Bridgeport Hospital less than 40.
“We’ve lost almost 500 patients across the health system,” Borgstrom said.
That includes two YNHH employees.
Petrini told the Independent that one employee who passed away from Covid-19 worked in human resources at Yale New Haven Hospital. The second employee who died from the novel coronavirus worked as a patient care assistant at Lawrence & Memorial Hospital in New London.
Balcezak said that the hospital has tested around 4,000 employees and medical staff so far. Around 22 percent, or around 880, have tested positive.
He said that the health system has also started testing asymptomatic employees. Around 2 percent of those tested who are not sick with a cough, fever, or other symptoms have had the virus.
The hospital system has tested a total of 50,000 people for Covid-19 since mid-March, and expects to ramp up testing to over 10,000 a day by the end of June. YNHH is currently still testing around 1,000 people a day.
Balcezak said these test numbers refer to nasal swab virus detection tests and do not include the antibody test. The hospital has also been conducting antibody tests, which determine who has previously had the virus. But for reporting purposes, he said, the hospital is focusing on active virus tests to best determine who currently has Covid-19.