Third World Scenes At LA Free Clinic: "As bad as the people in the Upper Amazon"
source: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lopez16-2009aug16,0,3959652.column
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- AndreaKnoll
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"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.
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.
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- tags:
- Health, Health Care, Healthcare, Health Care Reform, 2 more
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jubal
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First of all let me say that the writing was excellent on this article, kudos to the author. Talk about a perfect example of why we need to have a public option, regardless of whatever else the GOP wants out of the reform. Human beings lives are at stake while this partisan "side show" is being peddled to us, distracting us from the real issue at hand, which this article so vividly brings to life; the human suffering that needs to be redressed.
- 2 years ago
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jubal
