Byron Dorgan (D. ND) Chair of the Indian Affairs Committee

[EFerrari]

on the floor of the Senate, kicking @ss and telling truth.

Thank you, Senator. We're listening.

Edit: Sorry to be cryptic. He's laying out how appalling, even lethal the health care system is for Native Americans. And it's high effen' time.

"The fact is kids are dying, elders are dying, because we have a responsibility to do something about it and WE HAVEN'T DONE IT."

/ack

[EFerrari]

1. "We made promises , we signed treaties and we broke them

every single time.

Maybe in 2007, we can start keeping our work. "

[bobbolink]

5. "work" or "word" ?

:hi:

We'll all one.

We ALL need decent health care.

What is not to get????

[EFerrari]

6. oops. k-->d

:hi:

[bobbolink]

7. some days are like that.

I just had my nose fixed, and now my mouth doesn't work.

:rofl:

[xchrom]

2. kicking for first nations people.

[knitter4democracy]

3. Some friends in residency did a month on a rez. Scary.

They were flat-out frightened of the doctor, he was so bad. They started treating people on their own (and they were med students at the time) just to keep people from being killed. Hubby and I often talk about doing some rez medicine in a few years when our debts are down to a more manageable level.

Our First Peoples get treated like crap, if anyone remembers them at all. It's appalling.

[EFerrari]

4. I met a doctor in Zurich who had spent time at Pine Ridge.

He told me stories that I couldn't even believe at the time. :(

[knitter4democracy]

13. I've heard Pine Ridge is just plain scary.

How do we fix this? These people need and deserve better.

[Beausoir]

10. There is a program at UND med school called In-Med. Indians into medicine.

Quite a few from my husband's class moved back to their communities and set up practice. It's a great program.

I live near a couple of reservations and they are having a helluva time attracting and keeping physicians. Folks have to drive 90 miles to get medical care....in the winter...in Minnesota.

[EFerrari]

11. Good gawd.

:(

[knitter4democracy]

12. That's awful.

:(

Hubby worked with a Potawatomi resident when he was a third-year. She was awesome, and she was planning on going back to the rez she'd lived on as a kid to be their doctor.

I did a month of teaching in Chinle, AZ on the Navajo Nation Reservation, and I got really mad when I saw people living in the same kinds of places I saw in the barrios of Santo Domingo and Managua on mission trips in college. I also spent much of the month wanting to strangle my profs and fellow students.

[bobbolink]

8. I'm finishing a book called "Into the Canyon.." about the idealism

of people in the 60's, working on the rezes....

This one is about a lawyer and his wife, but it does touch on health care, too.

I appreciated reading about how they went about changing some things, and putting their idealism into practice.

I recommend it.

[bobbolink]

9. Interestingly, what I've heard from the pueblos of New Mexico

is that the efforts of the pueblos in recent years to establish "wellness centers" is having a great effect. Hopefully, that will spread out into the health care centers themselves. I've been curious but haven't found any info about the local health care centers.

The wellness centers have had a lot of very good effect in lowering crime rates, lowering teenage pregnancy rates, raising literacy rates, and many other health-related things. Over the Christmas holidays, people from San Felipe Pueblo told me they started out with a staff of 2, and now have 30 on their staff! I've been impressed with what I've heard.