Third Democrat files to run for seat on Sarasota Public Hospital Board

A retired hospital administrator from Chicago filed to run as a Democrat for At-Large Seat 1 on the Sarasota County Public Hospital Board, which governs the Sarasota Memorial Health Care System.

The decision by Alan Jerome Sprintz, who served in senior administrative positions at Olympia Fields Osteopathic Medical Center, Metropolitan Chicago Healthcare Council, and South Suburban Hospital, brings the number of Democrat candidates to three, and ensures a closed primary among Republicans for three of the four open seats on the hospital board.

“I have chosen to become a candidate for the Hospital Board because I saw a challenge to the goal of the community hospital to provide medical care to the community vs. profits for shareholders,” Sprintz said in a prepared statement. “I have watched the gutting of hospitals when they are privatized, just ask Senator (Rick) Scott (R-FL) how that works.

Sprintz, a city of Sarasota resident who holds a bachelor’s degree in history and political science from Pennsylvania State University and a master’s in hospital administration from George Washington University, said the candidacies for people who have been critical of Sarasota Memorial's handling of the COVID pandemic was another motivation.

“I read about the challenge to Sarasota Memorial Hospital to deviate from the recognized standards of care to introduce unproven treatments that were not validated by research, and delete proven treatments (such as) vaccines…” he said.

Democrats likely to field four hospital board candidates

Unless other candidates join the race, Sprintz would face the winner of an Aug. 20 primary between Republicans Sharon Wetzler DePeters and Tamzin Rosenwasser.

DePeters is an incumbent, while Rosenwasser is one of four “medical freedom” candidates hoping to join three other candidates who won seats on the nine-member board in 2022.

Daniel Kuether, chairman of the Sarasota County Democratic Party, noted that he plans to recruit a candidate to run for Central District Seat 1, where Republican incumbent Hospital Board Chairwoman Sarah Lodge will face medical freedom candidate Tanya Parus in what otherwise would be an open primary.

The At-Large Seat 3 has Democrat George Davis set to face the winner of the Republican Primary between Mary Flynn O’Neill, another medical freedom candidate who is the sister of former President Donald Trump's first national security advisor Michael Flynn and Pam Beitlich.

The At-Large Seat 2 race features medical freedom candidate Dr. Kendra Becker-Musante and outspoken hospital critic Dr. Stephen Guffanti in a three-way primary with fellow Republican Kevin Cooper, with the winner facing Democrat John A. Lutz in November.

So far, the Democratic Party has been specifically attacking the philosophy of the medical freedom candidates with what it’s dubbed a “Competence Team,” and campaigning against the possibility of the hospital being privatized, though all four medical freedom candidates have expressed a desire to keep the institution public.

"With the addition of Alan Sprintz to our Competence Team, Sarasota voters now have a clear choice between outstanding medical and hospital professionals and a so-called ‘medical freedom slate’ composed of extremists with no experience in medicine or hospital administration,” Kuether said in a prepared statement.

Board race to hinge of voters thoughts on ‘medical freedom’

The hospital board races had historically been low-profile prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, which prompted a “Health Freedom” slate of candidates to run for four of five seats in 2022.

The slate campaigned on skepticism about the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines, social distancing and mask mandates and was critical of Sarasota Memorial’s patient care during the pandemic.

Three of those four candidates won seats on the board. Their voices helped spur the hospital to commission an independent study of its practices during the pandemic.

Public meetings where that study was discussed attracted hundreds – including health-freedom proponents; hospital administration supporters actively recruited to speak in support of the institution; and state and national activists who came for the open mic opportunity to voice their grievances about everything from mask mandates to reported post-vaccine physical complications.

That created a scene with long lines of people screened through metal detectors. It also prompted some hospital critics to call for privitization of the public hospital

After the board voted to approve the COVID evaluation, hospital personnel were subjected to death threats both by voicemail and electronic media – something that medical freedom advocates also criticized.

Proposal could again pack hospital board meetings

While that uproar eventually cooled, Victor Rohe, one of the successful Health Freedom candidates created a new flashpoint in January, when he proposed that SMH incorporate a post on the hospital's website embracing assertions by Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo that COVID–19 vaccinations are risky and inappropriate for human use, a stance that federal health officials say is contrary to science and potentially deadly.That proposal has since been scheduled to be heard by the hospital board at its May 21 meeting.

Medical freedom proponents are again urging supporters to attend that meeting.

Even sitting as an eight-member board after Britt Riner resigned her position in At-Large Seat 3 to concentrate on a recent appointment by Gov. Ron DeSantis to the Florida Interagency Coordinating Council for Infants and Toddlers, Rohe may not have enough votes to see that motion pass successfully.

That means his proposal would likely become a campaign issue for the four medical freedom candidates.

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Retired hospital administrator files for Sarasota hospital board seat