7,000 Chicago hotel workers could lose health insurance by end of September
Some 7,000 Chicago hotel workers who remain laid off due to the pandemic risk losing their health insurance at the end of September, their union said Wednesday, making it difficult for them to pay medical bills when it’s unclear when their jobs will return.
Unite Here Local 1, which represents workers at 51 hotels in the city, is calling on the hotels to bolster the health insurance fund administered jointly by the union and employers.
The fund is dependent almost entirely on employer contributions, but the hotels have not been contributing toward the premiums of thousands of workers laid off since March, said Sarah Lyons, spokeswoman for Unite Here Local 1. The union estimates the fund will run out of money to cover the laid off workers by Sept. 30.
Hotels have not been bringing back many laid off employees as the industry continues to be devastated by drops in tourism and travel resulting from COVID-19. The room occupancy rate in Chicago was 37% during the week ended July 25, according to STR, a hospitality data research firm.
Still, Lyons said the hotels have been able to access government relief and should be able to contribute to workers’ health coverage.
“It’s clear to the employers what they need to do,” Lyons said. “Nothing is stopping them from paying. These workers are the backbone of the hospitality industry, and we believe they can afford it and they should do right by the workers who contributed decades of their lives.”
Hilton Hotels, which owns prominent Chicago hotels like the Palmer House Hilton and the Drake Hotel, declined to comment. Hyatt Hotels and Marriott International did not respond to requests for comment.
With more than half of Americans getting health insurance through their employers, many have lost their coverage as the pandemic wiped away their jobs.
About 5.4 million U.S. workers lost their health insurance from February through May and 27 million are at risk of losing coverage during the pandemic, according to a study released Wednesday by the Kaiser Family Foundation.
Jesus Morales, who worked as a banquet server at The Drake hotel before he was laid off in March, does not know what he will do if he becomes one of them. He saw how high medical bills can get when his wife had brain surgery several years ago, at a cost of about $300,000 that was covered by insurance.
He doesn’t know how he will be able to afford her current medications, which total about $200 a month, without insurance and without the extra $600 in unemployment benefits he was getting until the aid expired at the end of July. Getting COBRA coverage is too expensive, running $1,200 a month for a family.
“We think it’s not fair for the hotel to just leave us alone,” said Morales, who started at The Drake in 1986. “We have been there, loyal, for 33 years. They should be paying us (our health insurance) until this thing is over.”
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