Conservative Infant Death Syndrome (Isaiah J. Poole at TomPaine.com)

[marmar]

Conservative Infant Death Syndrome



The rate at which infants are dying has begun to creep upward in several Southern states. This is an entirely predictable—and deadly—outcome of a systematic squeezing of federal and state health programs under conservative rule.

The report in The New York Times Sunday that outlined some of the effects of cuts in federal and state health programs on infant care, particularly in Mississippi under Republican Gov. Haley Barbour, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, certainly was no surprise to Julie Winokur, an independent filmmaker. She has spent the past few months investigating health care problems in Tennessee, where Democratic governor and former health care executive Phil Bredesen took a page from the conservative playbook and slashed a Medicaid program that had been hailed as one of the most inclusive in the country.

Bredesen, who took office in 2002, cut 170,000 people from the Medicaid rolls. Wonokur got to meet some of the casualties — people who were on dialysis who were cut off from their treatments, or patients under psychiatric care who no longer could receive their medications. “These policies were extremely damaging,” she said.

Winokur’s film on the results, “Collateral Damage ,” was shown on Capitol Hill Monday to an audience of congressional staff members, as part of a larger campaign of at least 200 film showings during this week, which has been designated “Cover The Uninsured Week.”

“There is absolutely no question,” Winokur says, that the tragedies caused by Bredersen’s actions in Tennessee, Barbour in Mississippi or by governors and legislators where health care is deteriorating, especially among the poor and among people of color, are caused by the inherent flaws of a conservative ideology that turns its back on public investment and forces people to fend for themselves against a rapacious insurance industry. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2007/04/24/conservative_infant_death_syndrome.php

[jwirr]

1. Hopefully this will be shown on Link or PBS. This needs to be seen

by the nation.

[MasonJar]

2. That is a good dem to get rid of...however, with the federa; gov't

spending multi-billions on the Iraq War the states have had to take up an enormous slack. That does not excuse a dem, former health care executive, from doing away with a model program.