Oct. 2--Citing rising costs and fewer patients, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. is closing the onsite medical center at its corporate headquarters in Akron at the end of the year.

The Goodyear Family Medical Center had been providing primary-care services to employees and retirees at the site on Goodyear Boulevard since 1989. Workers and retirees pay lower co-payments by using the practice.

But the company has removed liabilities for United Steelworkers retiree health-care benefits from its balance sheet by fully funding a $1 billion Voluntary Employees' Beneficiary trust, or VEBA, that will pay for retirees' health care.

Once the VEBA takes effect, accounting rules prohibit covered retirees from using the onsite clinic, because the company can no longer contribute toward their health care, spokesman Keith Price said.

Goodyear would not say how many employees and retirees use the medical practice and pharmacy, which is operated by Take Care Health Systems.

In a letter to employees and retirees, Goodyear indicated that USW retirees "make up a significant portion" of patients who use the onsite medical practice and pharmacy.

"When you look at the active employees who use that as their doctor's office or their pharmacy, the volume of business from actives isn't enough to make it viable for the operation to continue," Price said.

Until the end of the year, "Goodyear plans to explore external options that could possibly retain the medical center's services," Thomas Broderick, the company's director of compensation and benefits, said in a recent letter to employees and retirees.

Take Care is continuing to operate an onsite clinic at another Goodyear facility in Alabama.

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