Now, let me see ... UPMC, a "nonprofit" organization, is on TV more than once every evening advertising its services. The money spent on these TV ads for a "nonprofit" organization would have been better spent saving UPMC Braddock hospital, a much-needed institution in a struggling town ("UPMC to Close Braddock Hospital," Oct. 17).

Why is a "nonprofit" advertising, anyway?

ANNE O'BRIEN
Munhall

Why all or nothing? UPMC should make a serious study of adapting UPMC Braddock into a large-scale clinic offering acute and well-check medical care (on the scale of the urgent-care centers now cropping up), prenatal visits and chronic disease maintenance services (such as for diabetes, dialysis, etc.).

This would provide vital services to the community and preserve the hospital as a rich community asset that could also offer classes and services concerning healthy living, drug intervention, weight control, perhaps eye and dental care and many others to a historic town that certainly deserves the region's care and attention.

MARK MATERA
Franklin Park

The patient is dead and all that remains is the disposal of the body. Under-utilization of beds and over-utilization of utility meters has provided the toxic mix to force UPMC to abandon its valiant 13-year effort to rescue the floundering Braddock Medical Center.

In coming months, a good-faith effort will be made to find alternative uses for this aging 277,000-square-foot facility. Hopefully this will lead to an entity that can continue to provide vital services and employment to the community with deep enough pockets to continue to properly maintain the building. The last thing Braddock needs is another abandoned structure, ultimately torn down at taxpayers' expense.

Should this effort fail -- and before UPMC sheds its suit of shining armor on its "tax-ride off" to the safety of the Green Zone in Monroeville -- all we can ask for is mercy. Tear down the structure and bury the corpse. Perhaps then at least we can build a gas station, convenience store and a Subway restaurant to provide us with enough fuel to sustain us in our quest to find our needed medical services.

MICHAEL TOBIAS, President
Dipcraft Manufacturing Co., Rankin

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