At free clinic, scenes from the Third World

[SuperDuper! 230]

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lo...,3959652.column

At free clinic, scenes from the Third World

Doctors and dentists volunteering their services at the Forum see scenes like those in impoverished areas overseas.

Steve Lopez

August 16, 2009

"Do you want to see the tooth?" Dr. Mehrdad Makhani asked me Friday morning at the free clinic being staged inside Inglewood's Fabulous Forum. "Come. I'll show you."

Jenny McLean, 36, opened her mouth and Makhani aimed a little flashlight in there.

"You see here?" he said.

The area around a back tooth was red and swollen, and McLean's eyes were teary with discomfort. She'd endured the pain for more than a year because she's had neither insurance nor the money for a dentist since losing her job as a social worker.

It was a story repeated hundreds of times last week at the Forum, where a nonprofit called Remote Area Medical had brought in volunteers to treat legions of the uninsured.

"Here, look at this," said Makhani, pointing to a second tooth that would have to be extracted and yet another that needed a root canal.

Makhani pointed me to another dentist. "Talk to him. He's worked in Brazil."

That would be Joseph Chamberlain, a Westwood dentist who said he's done charity work in Brazil, but not in conditions like this.

"They have a nice system of public hospitals and clinics," he said.

But don't patients have to wait for treatment?

"Yes," Chamberlain said. "But not like this. Not for a year."

Stan Brock, who founded RAM in 1985 to bring medical care to Third World countries, told me that in 1992 he began getting requests to do the same work in the United States.

"The people we're seeing here have teeth as bad as the people in the Upper Amazon," said Brock, who used to tangle with wild beasts on "Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom."

It would be nice if we could send Brock to the nation's capital and have him grab the vipers and hyenas by their necks until they work out a healthcare reform plan. But Brock has a better idea: The nation's leaders should instead come spend a day at one of his clinics and learn a thing or two.

He pulled out a chart showing that at his last medical jamboree, in Virginia, volunteer dentists performed 4,304 tooth extractions in two days, among various other medical procedures.

"President Obama was just down the road somewhere a couple days later, talking about healthcare," Brock said. "I think it would have been a lot more interesting if he came to our clinic."

Eugene Taw, an ear, nose and throat specialist with the Buddhist Tzu Chi Free Clinic in Alhambra, was one of many Forum volunteers who has worked in other parts of the world. Yes, he said, there are far too many parallels between the uninsured in the United States and the residents of impoverished Third World nations.

At the Forum, his patients included a diabetic amputee who had not been able to buy his medicine for months, a retiree who couldn't afford an X-ray for a lung problem, and a 30ish female diabetic with a kidney ailment so serious that Taw called for an ambulance to take her to a hospital.

"This is great for helping people in need," Taw said of the Forum clinic. "But it's not a good way to do healthcare."

Diabetes and hypertension require regular maintenance, Taw said, rather than occasional urgent trips to an emergency room after the patient deteriorates and the treatment is more expensive. By some estimates, Taw said, 85% of the estimated 47 million uninsured Americans are members of working families. So why not divide the cost of their health insurance evenly among employer, employee and the government?

Taw said he'd seen the Friday headline in The Times about the latest cut in California's Healthy Families Program budget, which means nearly 670,000 children could lose medical coverage by next June. A disaster in the making, he said. Yes, and Brock told me the biggest difference between the Third World and the United States is that in our country, children have had far greater access to doctors.

The huge turnout each day at the Forum made it clear that although Southern California has quite a few free medical and dental clinics, there aren't enough to handle the demand. Among those waiting patiently for help was Walter Samwel, a 70-year-old Vietnam vet from Gardena who has been putting off a root canal for two years.

I asked Samwel why he didn't go to the VA and he said they're swamped with recently returning vets, and more severe dental problems take priority. He had arranged time off from his part-time job as a maintenance man at a Long Beach senior center to come to the Forum, but this was his third attempt to get help. The first two days, his number was too high, and the dental clinic shut down before he was called.

Would his Medicare cover the dental work?

No, he said. There's lots it doesn't cover.

There's something shamefully wrong, I told him, when a man who served his country overseas for seven years can't get basic dental care.

"This is true," Samwel said, "but nobody wants to hear it."

Across the Forum, Adrienne Teeguarden was waiting for her first eye exam in 2 1/2 years. Since her layoff as a clothes designer, she's been working as a part-time nanny and can't afford health insurance or glasses.

Greg Pearl, an optometrist who has done medical relief in Mexico and South America for Volunteer Optometric Services to Humanity, said it's outrageous that vision and dental care are not in most U.S. insurance plans and are rarely part of any conversation on healthcare reform.

When I asked him about differences in the patients he sees overseas and in clinics such as the one at the Forum, he had a quick answer.

"Here, the patients speak English."

I can't say I was surprised by the spectacle at the Forum, but with each of two visits, I knew I was witnessing the perfect distillation of an unconscionable societal failure. Whether the answer includes the public option Obama has pitched, or the clampdown on obscene insurance company profits proposed by a doctor friend of mine in Wednesday’s column, a civil society has no excuse for not finding a better way.

"I don't have the answers," said Makhani, the dentist who insisted I look closely at his patient's ailing mouth. "I'm not a politician. But I have people here with infected teeth, gums, abscesses. I saw a lady bus driver who lost her job and she's walking around here crying. Her tooth is infected, she's in pain and she can die from this. This is disastrous. This is a Third World country and people need to come and see this."

Like hundreds of other volunteers at the Forum, including roughly 20 dentists simultaneously working on patients while many, many more waited their turn, Makhani had but one motive.

"Why do I do this? What do you think? Look at the need," he said. "What would you have done? Just look at the need."

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

[one...two...tree 2,762]

According to many on the Right, these people simply need to better manage their money in order to afford to purchase health insurance.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

According to many on the Right, these people simply need to better manage their money in order to afford to purchase health insurance.

You mean, like this:

Low-income families get back-to-school grants

GOP rips program: 'No strings attached'

ALBANY - The state is providing $200 back-to-school grants to more than 800,000 children in low-income families through $140 million in federal stimulus money and a $35 million grant from billionaire George Soros.

Soros' gift allows the state to access $140 million in a 4-to-1 matching grant program through the stimulus package, Gov. David Paterson announced Tuesday in Manhattan. The goal is to have needy families buy back-to-school supplies for their children.

Paterson said the slumping economy has put "families into the position where they are going to have to use their money for rent and the most basic of supplies" and may not have money for their children's school supplies.

Families that get public assistance or food stamps automatically received the one-time $200 payment Tuesday if they have school-aged children between ages of 3 and 17.

Republicans criticized the plan, saying the $200 was deposited into state-issued debit cards, so there is no requirement that the money be used for back-to-school supplies, or that a child has to be enrolled in school for the family to get the money.

"It's a highly questionable government giveaway - no strings attached, no legislative oversight, just visit your local ATM," said Sen. George Winner, R-Elmira. "What's happening to accountability in this government?"

"It should be done on a programmatic basis where you have accountability and you know how it is being spent," said Rockland County Executive Scott Vanderhoef.

Soros, a global financier and political activist, donated the money through his Open Society Institute.

http://www.stargazette.com/article/2009081...o-school+grants

Edited August 16, 2009 by Mister_Bill

[Ban Hammer 13,333]

so we have a convicted felon donating money to influence voters

[peejay 327]

According to many on the Right, these people simply need to better manage their money in order to afford to purchase health insurance.

You mean, like this:

Low-income families get back-to-school grants

GOP rips program: 'No strings attached'

ALBANY - The state is providing $200 back-to-school grants to more than 800,000 children in low-income families through $140 million in federal stimulus money and a $35 million grant from billionaire George Soros.

Soros' gift allows the state to access $140 million in a 4-to-1 matching grant program through the stimulus package, Gov. David Paterson announced Tuesday in Manhattan. The goal is to have needy families buy back-to-school supplies for their children.

Paterson said the slumping economy has put "families into the position where they are going to have to use their money for rent and the most basic of supplies" and may not have money for their children's school supplies.

Families that get public assistance or food stamps automatically received the one-time $200 payment Tuesday if they have school-aged children between ages of 3 and 17.

Republicans criticized the plan, saying the $200 was deposited into state-issued debit cards, so there is no requirement that the money be used for back-to-school supplies, or that a child has to be enrolled in school for the family to get the money.

"It's a highly questionable government giveaway - no strings attached, no legislative oversight, just visit your local ATM," said Sen. George Winner, R-Elmira. "What's happening to accountability in this government?"

"It should be done on a programmatic basis where you have accountability and you know how it is being spent," said Rockland County Executive Scott Vanderhoef.

Soros, a global financier and political activist, donated the money through his Open Society Institute.

http://www.stargazette.com/article/2009081...o-school+grants

Kind of like the Hurricane Katrina "victims" that got a free bus ride to Houston, 3 hots & a cot at the Astrodome, and Uncle Sugar sh*t them a $2000 debit card (no strings attached). The fun began when the debit purchases from the "victims" were tracked. Titty bars, booze, cigs, etc.

But gee, we gotta get these folks back up on their feet. Ha!

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Yep. Those dirty poor people. You give them an inch and they'll take a mile. The only way to teach 'em that poverty doesn't pay is to deny them any help up front. That'll teach 'em.

[peejay 327]

Yep. Those dirty poor people. You give them an inch and they'll take a mile. The only way to teach 'em that poverty doesn't pay is to deny them any help up front. That'll teach 'em.

Or keep 'em on a short leash. You're not exactly dealing with folks that are adept at managing their own lives is any kind of a competent manner.

#### empowerment. When you come to the table looking for a handout you get what you get and if you don't like the strings...tough sh*t. Take it or leave it.

[Jauque 1]

According to many on the Right, these people simply need to better manage their money in order to afford to purchase health insurance.

Agreed or alternatively set aside money in case you need to pay full price for health related problems.

[lostinblue 1,989]

Yep. Those dirty poor people. You give them an inch and they'll take a mile. The only way to teach 'em that poverty doesn't pay is to deny them any help up front. That'll teach 'em.

There is nothing preventing you from putting more of your own money to help the poor. Salvation army will take all you care to donate. Trouble is you want to donate all my money

[Sofiyya 1,687]

When Obama and the Dems defy their teachers' union allies to allow tax dollars to be used to provide open competition for union controlled school districts that hamstring public education in urban areas, then I'll rethink how sincere he is about heath care reform. One fo the first acts he did as president was to oppose refunding of a program that allows poor but high-achieving Washington DC students to have what he makes sure his own children have - an elite and rigorous education. Only after his hypocrisy was noted did he come to this "compromise" that still destroys the dream for many disadvantaged school children who will not have the chance to suceed that they deserve.

If you are serious about equal opportunity for all, call your representatives in support of programs such as these that are opposed by Democrats.

Obama Offers D.C. Voucher Compromise

Tuition Grants Would Continue for Private School Students Already in Program

By Bill Turque and Shailagh Murray

Washington Post Staff Writers

Thursday, May 7, 2009

President Obama will propose setting aside enough money for all 1,716 students in the District's voucher program to continue receiving grants for private school tuition until they graduate from high school, but he would allow no new students to join the program, administration officials said yesterday.

The proposal, to be released in budget documents today, is an attempt to navigate a middle way on a contentious issue. School choice advocates, including Republicans and many low-income families, say the program gives poor children better access to quality education. Teachers unions and other education groups active in the Democratic Party regard vouchers as a drain on public education that benefits relatively few students, and they say the students don't achieve at appreciably higher levels at their new schools.

Congress voted in March to cut off funding after the 2009-10 academic year unless the entire program is reauthorized by lawmakers, a dim prospect in the Democrat-led body. The White House proposal would revise the law and secure grants for the coming school year, but Obama has to persuade Democratic lawmakers to support a gradual phaseout by continuing to include grant funding in future appropriation bills.

His proposal drew support from some backers of the voucher program, officially known as the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program.

"I think it's a step in a good direction," said former District mayor Anthony A. Williams (D), a major proponent of the voucher program, established by a Republican-led Congress in 2004.

Others called the proposal a weak attempt to placate school choice advocates.

"It's a cop-out. They're just trying to buy people off," said Joseph E. Robert Jr., a philanthropist and founder of Fight for Children, a nonprofit group that seeks educational opportunities for low-income children.

The Department of Education recently issued a three-year analysis of student achievement under the program that found limited gains in reading and no significant progress in math. But the White House concluded that moving the children back to public schools amounted to an unnecessary disruption.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan had told reporters that it didn't make sense "to take kids out of a school where they're happy and safe and satisfied and learning."

More than 8,000 District students have applied for scholarships since the program's inception, and about 3,000 have received the grants of as much as $7,500 a year for private or parochial schools. Of the 1,716 current scholarship recipients, about 1,400 are in pre-kindergarten through eighth grade. The largest cohort, 211 students, is in second grade, according to figures provided by the Washington Scholarship Fund, which administers the voucher program.

"We're delighted for the children and their families, and we're also delighted that the administration appreciates the value of this program," said Gregory M. Cork, president and chief executive of the scholarship fund. "At the same time, we'd love to see others get a chance to have the opportunity."

Before Congress cut off funding for new scholarship students, 630 had applied for fall 2009. About 200 of those were awarded scholarships that were rescinded after the congressional action, Cork said.

Several hundred voucher and school choice supporters, including children from private schools attended by scholarship recipients, donned yellow T-shirts and rallied at Freedom Plaza in front of the Wilson Building yesterday. They called on federal lawmakers to fully restore the program.

Some cited a recent survey that found that 38 percent of members of Congress have sent children to private schools. About 20 percent of the lawmakers attended private schools, almost twice the rate of the general public.

"Your tax dollars go to pay the same members of Congress, 40 percent of whom send their kids to private schools," Robert said. "I am 100 percent for public schools . . . but this is about your rights, your civil rights."

Patricia William, whose 12-year-old son, Fransoir, is a seventh-grade scholarship student at Sacred Heart School in Northwest Washington, said his five years in the program made an incalculable difference.

"I have never made a better decision than to apply for the program," she said.

Told of the president's decision, Fransoir said: "I think that's good. Instead of pulling us out while we're learning, we can stay."

Edited August 17, 2009 by Sofiyya

[Pinocchio Liberal 268]

Yep. Those dirty poor people. You give them an inch and they'll take a mile. The only way to teach 'em that poverty doesn't pay is to deny them any help up front. That'll teach 'em.

Give a dirty homeless dude a twenty next time you see one, then watch what he does with it.

[Danno 1,228]

I'm sure all those Illegals must feel "Right at home" with this 3rd-world Clinic atmosphere they have helped Cultivate.

Are we suppose to act surprised that the system is going under?

When you have a poor, uneducated mass of people relocating illegally in your area..... YEA, free sh_t is gonna go fast!

... And California was going to "teach the rest of the country" on how to do SOCIAL ENGINEERING. Now they don't have money for the LEGALS

*My Cruel humor is aimed directly at the People who invited this problem on themselves and their state not the unfortunate suffering "third-worlders" who should have stayed home where the treatment was so much better ...(Or so were are told).

Edited August 17, 2009 by Danno