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Congresswoman Veronica Escobar (TX-16) and Cindy Stout, CEO and President of El Paso Children’s Hospital (EPCH) announced that EPCH has been awarded a total of $1,500,000 in federal grant funding to assist with the impact of incurring additional expenses for the care of young coronavirus (COVID-19) patients, stoppage of elective procedures, unreimbursed expenses, and lost revenues due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“As the only stand-alone children’s hospital in the border region, the El Paso Children’s Hospital has been providing hope and compassionate quality care to young patients, including those with COVID-19, and their families during this difficult time,” said Congresswoman Escobar. “Supporting healthcare workers and medical facilities has been one of my top priorities throughout this pandemic, and I am proud to have advocated to secure this timely critical funding to ensure EPCH is able to continue caring for children in El Paso, and throughout the entire West Texas and Southern New Mexico region.”

"This pandemic has created some unfortunate financial circumstances for all hospitals, to include El Paso Children's Hospital. Since the pandemic started, we have lost over 50% of our volume due to elective and non-urgent surgeries and other appointments needing to be cancelled. We very much appreciate the efforts of Congresswoman Escobar and how she has become a huge champion in ensuring that our community and hospitals like ours aren’t left out of the relief funds,” said Stout. “EPCH is not tax funded, so being part of this relief funding will allow us to cover COVID-19 related expenses and some lost revenue, providing some needed relief to our hospital and maintaining our financial stability.”

The funding was authorized and made available by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, the third coronavirus response which Congresswoman Escobar helped craft with community input and was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives and signed by President Trump on March 27, 2020.

The CARES Act secured critical provisions for El Paso workers and their families and made the unprecedented and historic investment of almost $200 billion for our health care system in its fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The funding will be distributed to healthcare providers and hospitals by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) through a new grant program to cover unreimbursed health care related expenses and lost revenues attributable to the public health emergency resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Learn more about HHS grants here.

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