interest-rate swaps

Hospitals Paying Wall Street Instead of Workers and Helping Patients

A fairly amazing story is on Swaps Backfire on Hospitals Firing Workers to Pay Wall Street:

at least 500 nonprofits that entered into the derivatives with Wall Street in an effort to cut costs, according to Moody’s Investors Service. Instead of being able to take advantage of the lowest interest rates since Dwight D. Eisenhower was president, tax-exempt groups are getting hit with a double whammy of rising borrowing costs and demands for collateral from financing tools they didn’t understand.

I don't understand this either but it appears financial managers of non-profits bought swaps to hedge on interest rates.

From wikipedia: