St. Joseph’s Health furloughs about 500 employees amid COVID-19 financial fallout

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — St. Joseph’s Health has furloughed about 500 employees to deal with the financial consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has greatly reduced the hospital’s revenue streams from non-essential surgeries and patient visits.

The staff being furloughed are those who are not directly involved in the hospital’s care for COVID-19 patients, according to a message to employees from Leslie Luke, president and CEO of St. Joseph’s Health, which the health system provided to CNYBJ.

The furloughed employees will retain several benefits such as health, dental, and basic life insurance, and St. Joseph’s “intent is to bring them back to work when demand for care returns.”

“As you well know, this unprecedented event has created a serious disruption to our operations, our colleagues and the people we serve. While we are well-prepared for the increase in inpatient volumes anticipated with the local COVID-19 surge, we are not generating enough revenue to cover the significant losses associated with state-mandated cancellations of outpatient procedures and [patient] visits,” Luke wrote.

Besides the furloughs, Luke said that St. Joseph’s Health has reduced all discretionary spending and has frozen all capital expenditures. The health system has also reduced pay for all senior leaders (vice presidents and above).

St. Joseph’s Health has also redeployed about 150 employees to different roles and locations across the system. The organization has also reduced some full-time schedules to part-time.

Luke noted that the federal relief package (the CARES Act) will help offset some of the increased costs for health-care providers, but “it will not fully cover the deficits we are incurring.”

Th CEO had notified the organization that it was planning for furloughs in a memo that St. Joseph’s forwarded to CNYBJ earlier this month.