The employees at the St. Josef Hospital in Schweinfurt can be happy: Contrary to what was recently announced, their hospital will not be closing for the time being. “There will be no layoffs, hospital operations will continue,” said the leadership of the “Congregation of the Sisters of the Redeemer” on Wednesday evening. The Sisters of the Redeemer are the sponsors of the hospital. A year ago they announced that they would no longer be able to keep the loss-making house. The search for a new provider has so far been unsuccessful, which is why the closure recently seemed unavoidable.
The order is by no means free of its financial worries. However, it turned out that a closure could cost the sisters even more than continuing to operate. The total closure costs, which include high funding repayments, amounted to 30 million euros, said the congregation’s managing director Martin Stapper. This sum is due within six to nine months. “We can’t afford that,” he said. At the same time, there have been numerous expressions of solidarity and efforts to save the house in recent weeks. We now want to give them another chance.
“I promised the employees that we would check every straw,” Stapper said. One such straw is evidently seen in St. Josef in the initiative of city councilor Stefan Labus (Free Voters). Labus has founded an association to save the hospital and wants to use it to collect money for St. Josef through charity campaigns. Labus said he was delighted with the turnaround at St. Josef on Thursday. He called for donations to the clinic. The goal is to collect 200,000 euros by the end of the year. The association is also considering taking a five percent stake in a possible sponsorship, said Labus. At the same time, they want to look for investors.
More investors will be necessary because the announced donation amount will hardly be enough to save St. Josef. The 272-bed house will have a deficit of four million euros in 2023.
Nothing has changed in the basic attitude that St. Josef cannot be led into the future alone, said Stapper. So far, the congregation had been looking for someone who could take over the house. But that turned out to be difficult. The city of Schweinfurt declined, as did the district. Both apparently shied away from the incalculable costs. Strategically, St. Josef has the problem that, as a basic and standard care provider, it is only 1.5 kilometers as the crow flies from the Leopoldina Clinic, a large primary care provider. However, the clinic reform relies on fewer and better equipped hospitals. In emergency care, for example, there will not be two locations so close to each other in Schweinfurt in the long term.
The Schweinfurt city council recently advocated that the Leopoldina Hospital should take over departments such as the St. Josef palliative care ward so that care remains assured. Preparations for this have also begun at the Leopoldina Clinic. Health Minister Judith Gerlach (CSU) expressed relief on Thursday that St. Josef would remain open for the time being. This is good news for employees and patients “and the entire Schweinfurt region”. At the same time, she called on the carriers to negotiate quickly. The existing structures would have to be adapted. The minister knows that continuing like this will not work in Schweinfurt.