Gov. Maura Healey on Tuesday accused Steward Healthcare executives of “truly despicable” conduct and ordered Massachusetts and federal regulators to overhaul the proposed sale of Steward's physician network to for-profit insurance company Optum. He said he is asking them to consider it.
In an interview on WBUR's “Radio Boston,” Mr. Healy faced questions about whether he supported the proposed sale and what would happen if the sale did not go through.
“What needs to happen is to allow the relevant regulators to do their jobs, and that's the Health Policy Commission here in Massachusetts and the U.S. Department of Justice, which is currently looking at this issue.” Mr. Healy replied. “I trust these processes and believe that if the stewards provide us with the documentation, we can achieve the look we want.”
Steward, a hedge fund-backed organization that has been in the spotlight during the financial crisis, has been battling state regulators for years over access to financial records that Massachusetts requires from hospitals. Mr Healey on Tuesday called on the system to “come clean and provide documentation”, citing his work as attorney general in a lawsuit against Steward seeking access to relevant information.
It's unclear what steps the troubled Steward Healthcare will take next. Follow NBC10 Boston… Instagram: instagram.com/nbc10boston TikTok: tiktok.com/@nbc10boston Facebook: facebook.com/NBC10Boston X: twitter.com/NBC10Boston
After months of public scrutiny over Steward's shaky financial position, regulators last month cleared a potential sale of Stewardship Health's physician network to Optum Care, a subsidiary of UnitedHealth Group. He announced that he is considering it. But HPC leaders warned on April 11 that “key information from the parties is still outstanding,” and nearly the entire state's congressional delegation wrote a letter last week to confirm that the deal actually affects the state. expressed skepticism about whether it would help.
Healey's government is hosting a closed-door meeting with other health care providers to discuss the impact of Steward's uproar. She took aim at the for-profit organization's CEO, Ralph de la Torre, whom she described as “a guy who owns several yachts.”
“The Stewards have been truly despicable in their behavior here. Not the doctors, not the nurses, not the people who work at and even manage the Stewards facilities, but the Stewards leadership in Dallas, Texas. “In terms of what they've done,” she said, “in terms of removing all the assets and resources from these facilities that are essential and critical to providing care to the community.”
