Resistance:
Reclaim Mission
HEC is proud to be a part of Reclaim Mission, a regional coalition galvanizing voices across Western North Carolina to restore best-in-class healthcare at all the Mission hospitals. The call is for HCA to sell Mission to a nonprofit hospital system that is not obligated to generate profits for shareholders. Removing the profit motive is the best way to restore the patient-centered care WNC residents deserve and expect.
Reclaim Mission brings together physicians and retired physicians, other medical professionals, elected officials, neighborhood groups, religious congregations, and individual advocates to carry out an informed, long-term, multi-faceted strategy to get HCA out of WNC.
Reclaim Mission has nothing but unwavering support for the hospital workers who do their best every day under demoralizing conditions. It demands accountability from HCA’s corporate leadership, calling on them to honor Mission’s stated commitment to “the care and improvement of human life.”
Instead of living up to that promise, HCA has shown WNC the worst side of for-profit medicine. Its corporate leaders gutted staffing, putting patients’ health and lives in danger, as state and federal regulators have documented. HCA cut back services at the rural hospitals, shuttered primary care clinics, and threw longstanding networks of specialty care into disarray.
A diverse, determined group of activists coalesced to form HEC in 2018 when the sale was pending. We are proud to have worked with Attorney General Josh Stein to insert better protections for the hospitals into the sales agreement. But the ensuing years have been bitter, as everything we feared from the transition to for-profit medicine has come to pass.
Now, however, there’s a fresh surge of optimism and activism, centered in Reclaim Mission. Getting rid of HCA won’t happen easily, but it can happen. We won’t go away until they go away. And you can be a part of making the difference.
What can you do?
Tell Your Story
If you or someone you know has a bad experience at any of the hospitals – Mission, Angel, Highlands-Cashiers, Blue Ridge or Transylvania – report it!
The state and federal agencies that oversee hospitals are watching. They know about the problems we’re facing. And they control the purse strings. They can cut off payments from Medicare and Medicaid, which HCA absolutely depends on.
Report a problem to the state by calling
1-800-624-3004
Help pay for
the work
You can also support the resistance effort by donating funds via GoFundMe. Your tax-deductible contribution to HEC will pay for outreach and communications efforts, legal and administrative support, and the other nuts and bolts of mounting a sustained campaign.
