‘Crisis Mode’: As Hospitals Close, Mississippi Lawmakers Mull ‘Band-Aid’ Fixes

Mississippi Free Press

The Mississippi Legislature will address the state’s ongoing hospital closures, Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and House Speaker Philip Gunn said in press interviews on Tuesday as the legislative session began. At a press conference in November last year, House Democratic Leader Robert Johnson, D-Natchez, highlighted the dire situation in Mississippi.”[T]he state’s only burn center has closed,” he said. “The only neonatal intensive care unit in the Delta has closed. A Jackson hospital that serves rural portions of Hinds County is reducing critical services to stay afloat. Greenwood Leflore Hospital itself is on life support, staying open only with the help of the City and County putting up money to keep it from closing its doors for good.” The City of Greenwood and Leflore County jointly own the facility. Hosemann, who is president of the Mississippi Senate, said Tuesday during a press conference that he recently visited Greenwood Leflore Hospital, noting that it has cut some health services, including obstetrics and gynecology.

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Mississippi hit by 900% increase in newborns treated for syphilis

The number of babies in Mississippi being treated for congenital syphilis has jumped by more than 900% over five years, uprooting the progress the nation’s poorest state had made in nearly quashing what experts say is an avoidable public health crisis. The rise in cases has placed newborns at further risk of life-threatening harm in a state that’s already home to the nation’s worstinfant mortality rate. In 2021, 102 newborns in Mississippi were treated for the sexually transmitted disease, up from 10 in 2016, according to an analysis of hospital billing data shared by Dr. Thomas Dobbs, the medical director for the Mississippi State Department of Health’s Crossroads Clinic in Jackson, which focuses on sexually transmitted infections.
Feds give Greenville grant for primary care clinic as Delta faces loss of health care services

Local leadership in the Delta says the region’s crumbling health system has been abandoned by the state – so they’re figuring out how to fix it on their own with the help of federal funds. Greenville’s mayor and a local health clinic say they’re working to give people in the Delta better access to doctors and primary care, as hospitals around them shutter and strip back specialty care. As a result, the city of Greenville received $2 million in federal funds to construct a new health clinic in partnership with the Delta Health Center.