Another SC hospital puts workers on leave, cuts pay because of coronavirus outbreak
Columbia’s Providence Hospital has put 51 employees on temporary leave amid South Carolina’s ongoing coronavirus outbreak.
The employees will receive 25% of their regular salaries during their time on leave, and will continue to be enrolled in employee benefits, Providence Health said in a statement on Tuesday.
“Like all hospitals, in addition to fighting COVID-19 on the front lines of patient care, we have to manage the business impact we are experiencing due to significant decreases in volume and the utilization of services,” said Tina Creighton, Providence’s communications director.
Providence did not identify which departments at its two Richland County hospitals would be affected, but Creighton said the leave policy is limited to support staff and would not effect the emergency department.
The employees affected will have access to a disaster recovery fund that will assist employees in need during the crisis.
In addition, hours are also being adjusted “to align to the volume and acuity of patients we are seeing,” and hospital officers are taking a 10% reduction in salaries for the next two months.
That policy is in line with what LifePoint Health, the Tennessee-based company that owns the health system, is doing throughout the company.
LifePoint’s CEO and executive team are taking a 30% salary reduction for two months, and the company’s support center will see pay cuts of between 5% and 20%. A portion of those pay reductions will go into the company’s recovery fund.
“These are very hard decisions to make, and we are incredibly sensitive to the impact they have on our employees,” Creighton said. “However, these are necessary measures to ensure we are maximizing our resources and supporting our teams on the front lines of battling COVID-19.”
The main campus of Providence Hospital is located on Forest Drive, while its Northeast campus is on Farrow Road. Prisma Health announced last month plans to purchase the two Providence hospitals along with KershawHealth in Camden.
The hospital has seen a reduction in patients because it has canceled elective surgeries and other non-urgent procedures to focus on its coronavirus response.
Other hospitals are dealing with similar issues. Prisma Health has furloughed 3,900 employees at its Midlands and Upstate hospitals, which employ a total of 30,000 people. Nine hundred people have been laid off by the Medical University of South Carolina’s hospital system.
Across South Carolina, 3,553 people have been diagnosed with COVID-19, and 97 people statewide have died of the disease as of Tuesday.
South Carolina has paid out $53 million in unemployment claims from a federal fund established to compensate those who have lost jobs to the pandemic, adding an extra $600 each week per recipient.
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