Bill Moyers & Michael Winship: Oysters for Health Care

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Published on Saturday, July 18, 2009 by CommonDreams.org

Oysters for Health Care
by Bill Moyers and Michael Winship


This is a story of health care and two Americans; a tale of two citizens, if you will.

This week, Regina Benjamin was nominated by President Obama as our next surgeon general, charged with educating Americans on medical issues and overseeing the United States Public Health Service. She was the first African American woman to head a state medical society, a member of the board of trustees of the American Medical Association and last year was named the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation genius award.

But more important, she's a country doctor, a family physician along the Gulf Coast of Alabama, serving the poor and uninsured -- white, black and Asian. After Hurricane Katrina destroyed her clinic -- the second time a hurricane had done so -- she mortgaged her own home to rebuild it. The day it was to reopen, a fire burned the clinic to the ground. Moving to a trailer, Dr. Benjamin and her staff never missed a day of work.

Stan Wright, the tobacco-chewing mayor of Bayou La Batre, the small shrimp-fishing community in which Dr. Benjamin practices, told National Public Radio, "She'll do whatever she's gotta do to make sure everyone's taken care of."

Benjamin will no doubt bring that same ethic to the fight for health care reform. When President Obama announced her nomination in a Rose Garden ceremony Monday, Dr. Benjamin said, "These are trying times in the health care field, and as a nation, we have reached a sobering realization. Our health care system simply cannot continue on the path that we're on. Millions of Americans can't afford health insurance or they don't have the basic health services available where they live." .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/07/18-1

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