Coronavirus: MultiCare Health System implementing new measures amid financial losses

To ensure its long-term stability, MultiCare Health System announced several new measures to help protect the organization in response to financial losses.

The organization is asking employees to take voluntary furloughs.

It is also deferring hiring for some jobs and will eliminate training, travel and conference fees.

The organization also plans to cut executive salaries, with the President and CEO Bill Robertson taking a 41% reduction in pay.

MultiCare will also stop a special program that protects pay and benefits, which began on March 15 and extends through April 25.

Robertson said, “While difficult, these are necessary steps for us to take now, so that our organization remains capable of providing the necessary health care services that our patients and communities need and deserve. In the near-term, they will enable us to emerge from this current situation as a viable and vibrant organization that is prepared for the new realities of a changed world.”

The organization said it had seen a decline in volumes as it has temporarily halted its non-emergent surgeries and procedures, and patients have avoided health care services, switching its focus over the last weeks to COVID-19.

Officials with the organization said its operating margin for March was a loss of $34 million and it projects to lose in excess of $75 million for both April and May.

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