North Mississippi Health Services announces plan to furlough employees

North Mississippi Health Services announces plan to furlough employees starting next week.

Strain related to the coronavirus... the hospital system is now taking action to allievate some of the stress... w-t-v-a's kayla thompson is live with the announcement today and what it means for employees.

Today north mississippi health services announced their plan to furlough employees... "covid-19 has also presented us with the greatest financial challenge the health care industry has ever faced.

Just like our team responded to the clinical challenge, we need to take action and adjust our financial and business practices to address the financial challenges."

North mississippi health services released this video as well as an announcement - saying they will have to furlough employees to fight those financial challenges... a furlough is not the same as a layoff... but employees will not be paid and certain benefits will continue throughout the furlough period which could end up being 90 days... the senior leadership staff also took a 25 percent reduction in salary... ceo shane spees says the system has seen a 40 to 60 percent drop in the number of patients coming to their facilities... spees says if they did not take action and didn't get relief from the government...the organization estimates a loss of about 28 million dollars a month... not only will this impact employees but also our economy... "of course, the hospital is our largest employers but also with all of our other businesses, restaurants, and everything else, but hopefully we have a good foundation where when all of this is over, we can bounce back."

Mayor jason shelton says he believes north mississippi health services will be able to overcome this challenge.... "the hospital is going to recover we've got the largest rural hospital in the country it's just a fantastic facility with fantastic employees.

It's going to recover but just like everything else in the state and world economy it's going to take a little time it'll be difficult for us all but we'll all get through this together."

At the end of this video spees encourages employees through this tough time to remember why they are doing their job... "to help people and to make a difference."

The organization says that although they are making this change...it will not affect their ability to take care for covid-19 patients...