Federal help for rural hospitals, including some in northern California

The Sacramento Bee reported yesterday out of Jackson, California, population 4,651, under the headline, "As rural hospitals and health care struggle, California hospitals are fighting back." Here's an excerpt:

For the past three decades, the number of hospitals in American rural areas has been declining at a steep pace. Among California’s 50 rural hospitals, four are at high risk of closing. Twenty have shut down since 1995, experts say. 

On Thursday, the federal Department of Health and Human Services attempted to stop the bleeding with a $20 million grant, distributed across 21 states. 

California hospitals received $1.5 million. Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital in Grass Valley and Sutter Amador Hospital in Jackson each received $750,000 in Rural Residency Planning and Development Program grants to spend over a three-year period.

Journalist Caroline Ghisolfi quotes a press release from Alex Azar, the Secretary for Health and Human Services, who invokes Trump's commitment to (or at least popularity in) rural places:

Promoting the health of rural America is one of the Trump Administration’s healthcare priorities.  Supporting the training of healthcare providers in rural areas through grants like these is a key way to help expand rural access to care, and is part of an overall effort to support rural healthcare in sustainable, innovative, and flexible ways.

The Sutter Amador Hospital "will use the funds to expand its Family Medicine Residency Program to Jackson, making space for six additional physicians."