The proposed California Pacific Medical Center (CPMC) Cathedral Hill Hospital plan originally included shutting down inpatient services at St. Luke’s Hospital on Cesar Chavez Street. That plan faced fierce public opposition last year, and the current plan now includes a renovation (and shrinking) of St. Luke’s Hospital.

Although public opposition eventually forced administrators to agree to keep open a scaled-down version of St. Luke’s hospital, critics continue to say that the current plan takes vital care away from neighborhoods that already don’t have ready access to quality medical facilities, and focuses on specialized care that caters to the wealthy rather than the uninsured.

In addition, CPMC has been criticized for not providing enough “charity care” (free services) to the city’s poor and uninsured in exchange for corporate tax breaks that favor the nonprofit organization.

Although I think it’s wonderful that San Francisco will have a state-of-the-art health care facility in the near future, I also think that we need a facility that will cater to the need of all San Franciscans instead of an elite few (many of which will probably be non-city residents).

I also fear that scaling down the St Luke’s Hospital capability would be particularly devastating to District 6 residents because area citizens would then be forced to seek medical treatment only at San Francisco General Hospital.