Essential hospitals, a vital source of care for millions of low-income Americans, operate on the slimmest margins, due to their safety net mission. This leaves them with few resources to put toward infrastructure upgrades and modernization, let alone to build new facilities and clinics to meet growing community needs.
The pandemic gave us a glaring example of this challenge: It highlighted hospitals’ infrastructure shortcomings and their acute need for federal support to repair aging and deteriorating facilities and build health information technology capacity.
Patients in disadvantaged communities should not have to settle for time-worn facilities and outdated technology. Using a law nearly eight decades old, Congress has the power today to make a meaningful difference.
We urge Congress to support the infrastructure and emergency preparedness needs of essential hospitals by replenishing the Hill-Burton program with $10 billion over five years. This would enable them to embark upon much-needed construction and modernization projects to ensure they can continue providing the high-quality care all Americans deserve.