Bernie Moreno backed plan to raise health care costs, reward hospital executives

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Bernie Moreno served on the board of a hospital corporation that gave bonuses to executives and raised prices for patients.

Moreno is challenging incumbent Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown. A Morning Consult poll from September showed Brown leading Moreno by two percentage points.

From 2019 to 2021, Moreno was on the board of MetroHealth, a hospital system with locations in and near Cleveland. Moreno was appointed to the board at the request of MetroHealth CEO Akram Bustros. 

In 2019, Moreno and the MetroHealth board approved two new budgets that implemented a based variable compensation plan. These plans tie employee pay, particularly for senior leadership, to profitability. In other words, MetroHealth executives got bigger paychecks if the corporation earned more money.

According to public disclosures, MetroHealth increased prices on most of its services following the adoption of the based variable plan. Child delivery, both natural and by C-section, spiked by nearly 5%. Fetal non stress tests, which are intended to check the health of a developing fetus, went up 110%. Emergency care for patients with life-threatening injuries rose by nearly 85%.

MetroHealth reports that 90% of its patients are covered by public health insurance, meaning that government programs funded by taxpayers covered the bulk of the price increases. When Moreno was on the board, MetroHealth took in $152 million in Ohio taxpayer funds and $1.6 million in federal funds.

Moreno stepped down from the board when he launched his 2022 campaign for the U.S. Senate.

In 2022, Bustros was fired from MetroHealth when it was discovered he used the based variable system to award himself bonuses that he hadn’t earned.

Moreno suggested at a May 2023 town hall event that his tenure on the MetroHealth board gave him special insights into health 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 Moreno spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this story.