COVID-19 walloped Pa. hospitals with added costs, staffing needs. Here are the numbers.

Bethany Rodgers, USA TODAY NETWORK

Pennsylvania hospitals grappled with $8.1 billion in pandemic-related expenses and lost revenue during the COVID-19 crisis, in addition to staffing vacancies of nearly 30%, according to a new report exploring the repercussions of the public health emergency.

The pandemic strained the commonwealth’s health systems financially with $1.3 billion in increased staffing costs and $679 million spent on additional supplies and equipment, according to the report released Thursday by the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council, or PHC4, and the Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania.

Hospitals faced another $845 million in expenses between ramping up coronavirus testing, building emergency operations centers, quarantining patients and other initiatives, the analysis showed.

On top of that, the health systems suffered an estimated $5.3 billion in revenue losses during COVID-19, largely from pausing elective procedures at the pandemic’s outset in 2020.

The report did not reflect emergency aid provided by the federal or state governments.

The financial impacts from the pandemic have continued to affect hospitals, even with the waning of the public health emergency, said Nicole Stallings, president and CEO of the Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania.

“Not only are we seeing patients that are coming in sicker and staying longer, perhaps due to some avoided or delayed care … but we’re also dealing with persistent workforce shortages and significant financial constraints,” Stallings told reporters Wednesday.

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About 40% of the commonwealth’s hospitals are in the red financially and another 13% are functioning in a way that is “not sustainable,” Stallings said.

Hospitals are using pay increases, bonuses, different benefit structures and education programs to address vacancies, which averaged about 30% for positions such as nurses, nursing support staff and medical assistants in late 2022. Though there does seem to be progress in that area, Stallings said there is no quick fix.

“It took us years to get to this point with our workforce crisis,” she said. “And it’s going to take years for us to get out of that.”

Where in Pennsylvania did COVID-19 hit hardest?

The PHC4 report also contained detailed information about infection and hospitalization rates in different parts of Pennsylvania during the pandemic. Altogether, the commonwealth’s acute care hospitals recorded about 264,000 COVID-19 hospitalizations from March 2020 through December 2022.

The five counties with the highest infection rates were

  • Forest, with a rate of 35,353 per 100,000 residents;

  • Fulton, with a rate of 35,231 per 100,000 residents;

  • Bradford, with a rate of 34,809 per 100,000 residents;

  • Cambria, with a rate of 33,800 per 100,000 residents; and

  • Franklin, with a rate of 33,551 per 100,000 residents.

The five counties with the highest hospitalization rates were

  • Schuylkill, with a rate of 289.7 per 100,000 residents;

  • Northumberland, with a rate of 281.3 per 100,000 residents;

  • Philadelphia, with a rate of 268.7 per 100,000 residents;

  • Juniata, with a rate of 260.9 per 100,000 residents; and

  • Huntingdon, with a rate of 260.2 per 100,000 residents.

This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Pa. hospitals took $8.1 billion hit during pandemic, new report says

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