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House advances rural health reforms and restricts industrial assistance to hospital regions
Summary
The Utah House passed H.B. 216 to expand rural residents' access to local independent hospitals and H.B. 211 to limit Industrial Assistance Fund eligibility to areas within a 60-mile radius of rural hospitals. Sponsors said the measures protect small hospitals; critics warned the 60‑mile rule can be inflexible.
A bipartisan majority of the Utah House passed two companion measures aimed at shoring up rural health care and steering economic incentives to hospital regions.
Sponsors said H.B. 216 — described as the product of more than two years' work with a Health Policy Commission technical advisory group — would allow rural residents to receive services at local independent hospitals, community health centers and credentialed local providers even when managed-care arrangements otherwise required travel to distant facilities. The sponsor said, “This is a critical issue because of the location of a number of the hospitals and…
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