Triage is the process of sorting cases by urgency of medical condition: most severe treated first. If Karen can't breathe, she comes before Susie who got a paper cut at the office.* You can't treat patients based on their political views, skin color, religion, or any other factor.
*The paper cut example is a real one. I had to take my spouse to the emergency room once (on the recommendation of both his surgeon and primary care doctor) when a hematoma on his hip that was incurred from a bicycle accident several months before suddenly became a flaming purple swelling of his entire leg from hip to ankle. We signed in, explained the condition, and waited and waited and waited (5 hours in total). After about hour 3 1/2, two young women came in and sat across from us. One of them had gotten a bad paper cut at her office. She was taken before my spouse! So more than an hour later, we'd had it. We went up to the counter and my spouse said, "Do I have to take my pants off to show you this condition?!" We were ushered in and (I kid you not), the nurse screamed and the doctor said "Holy shit." It was a major staph infection, and thank heavens it had not yet entered a vein or he would be dead. He was hospitalized on intravenous mega-antibiotics for a couple of days and continued antibiotics at home. But he could easily have died if we hadn't at last intervened, because that triage person was an idiot.
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