The University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, which was severely damaged by Hurricane Ike back in September, announced this week it will lay off about 3,800 workers, nearly a third of its worked force because it’s running out of money.                

The Hurricane caused nearly $710 million in losses to the hospital and officials have said insurance covered only about $100 million. Consequently, the University of Texas Board of Regents said the hospital would have no money to operate in about three months.

On September 13, Ike blasted ashore near Galveston, flattening buildings and killing at least 37 people in Texas and more than 70 nationally. The storm was the most expensive in Texas history with an estimated $11.4 billion in damages so far.

The cuts at the University of Texas Medical Branch were not a surprise, and some regents have complained for years that the medical branch, which before the storm already faced a $35 million deficit, could not go on bleeding money through a long practice of caring for the state’s poor. Therefore, the cuts were inevitable.

“We knew part of this would happen after Ike. We had a significant bump early in volume-and it's settled back down. But it's still running ten to fifteen percent higher than we normally would expect to-and we anticipate that's probably permanent,” said Doctor James McCarthy, Emergency Services Director at Memorial-Hermann Hospital in Houston's Medical Center. He also added that the biggest impact can be found in the increased number or trauma cases seen at the facility.