Bernie Moreno’s Tenure at MetroHealth Under Scrutiny Amid Senate Campaign
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Bernie Moreno previously served on the board of a hospital corporation that awarded bonuses to executives and increased prices for patients.
Moreno is vying to unseat incumbent Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown. A September Morning Consult poll indicated Brown leading Moreno by two percentage points.
Between 2019 and 2021, Moreno was on the board of MetroHealth, a hospital system located in and around Cleveland. His appointment to the board was requested by MetroHealth CEO Akram Boutros.
In 2019, Moreno and the board approved two new budgets that implemented a variable compensation plan. These plans linked employee pay, particularly for senior leadership, to the hospital’s profitability. As a result, MetroHealth executives received larger paychecks if the corporation’s earnings increased.
Public disclosures reveal that MetroHealth raised prices on most of its services following the adoption of the variable compensation plan. Charges for child delivery, both natural and by C-section, increased by nearly 5%. Fetal non-stress tests saw a 110% rise, and emergency care for life-threatening injuries jumped by almost 85%.
MetroHealth reports that 90% of its patients are covered by public health insurance, indicating that taxpayer-funded government programs covered most of the price hikes. During Moreno’s tenure on the board, MetroHealth received $152 million in Ohio taxpayer funds and $1.6 million in federal funds.
Moreno resigned from the board when he launched his 2022 U.S. Senate campaign.
In 2022, Boutros was dismissed from MetroHealth after it was found that he used the variable compensation system to award himself unearned bonuses.
Speaking at a May 2023 town hall event, Moreno suggested that his experience on the MetroHealth board provided him with unique insights into healthcare administration.
“We can take a lot of cost out of the health care system,” Moreno said. “I was on the board of a hospital system in Cleveland. I saw that firsthand. We waste enormous, enormous sums of money on health care. So that’s how we attack healthcare, right? We got to lower the cost, not about lowering the service provided, but lowering the cost of doing that.”
A spokesperson for Moreno did not respond immediately to a request for comment regarding this story.
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