Maxine Waters Poised To Confront Health Insurance Industry W/Need For Charity Health Clinincs

[KittyWampus]

LA Sports Arena Hosts Health Clinic Of Last Resort

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By REUTERS
Published: August 13, 2009

INGLEWOOD, California (Reuters) - Inside an aging sports arena, where rows of dental chairs and a hospital smell have replaced the former Los Angeles Lakers basketball court, thousands of Americans are seeking free healthcare.

Hundreds were turned away just on Tuesday, the first day of a weeklong clinic run by the nonprofit Remote Area Medical Volunteer Corp as part of its mission to provide free health, dental and eye care in needy spots around the world.

It marks the first time in RAM's 25 years that it has gone to a major U.S. metropolitan area -- a reminder that even in Los Angeles, with world-class doctors and hospitals, many do not have access to affordable healthcare.

RAM is apolitical, but its mobile medical center has sprung up in the working-class LA suburb of Inglewood against the backdrop of an increasingly bitter public debate over President Barack Obama's proposed overhaul of the U.S. healthcare system.

A GLIMPSE INTO THE PROBLEM

Its organizers, including founder Stan Brock, have steered clear of the healthcare battle in Washington, which centers on Obama's pledge to provide for the nearly 46 million uninsured Americans and charges by conservatives that he will only make the situation worse by "socializing" medicine.

Brock said he started RAM, which is best-known for its work in Third World countries, to provide healthcare in remote parts of the world where people have no access to doctors and medical supplies.

His mobile clinics are not seen as a solution to America's complex healthcare issues but the turnout in Inglewood has offered a glimpse into the depth of the problem.

Obama's political allies, who have seen his fellow Democrats confronted by angry constituents at "town hall" meetings, seized on the RAM event as an opportunity to plug the president's $1 trillion plan.

"There are a lot of town halls going on across America but you know, I'm going to have another story to tell when I get back to Washington, D.C. It will be about what happened here in Inglewood," Congresswoman Maxine Waters, a Democrat who has pushed hard for Obama's reforms, told a news conference on the sidelines of the opening day.

Some 8,000 people were expected to file through the Forum sports arena for everything from Pap smears to acupuncture to eyeglass fittings.

"It certainly proves that here in the inner city healthcare is needed in the worst way," Inglewood Mayor Roosevelt Dorn said. "If that doesn't send a message across America, I don't know what will."

snip

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/08/13/news/news-us-usa-healthcare-freeclinic.html

[pinto]

1. Kick

:kick:

[earthboundmisfit]

2. Inner city and rural areas especially

But the need is so great everywhere that these clinics could be set up several to a state, and every single one of them would have thousands coming in for treatment.

[tosh]

3. +1 & kick.