A reader in Louisiana shows how the budget cuts affect the neediest persons in the state:
Louisiana is in the top 5 for cancer deaths, infant death, and AIDS.
Baton Rouge, the capital is #1 in America for new AIDS infections.
And the busline (such as it is) ends well before it reaches the new Women’s Hospital where most of the babies are delivered and women receive ob/gyn care. They have to walk from the last bus stop to the hospital down a 4-lane highway and can only get a van if they have Medicaid. It also makes parents with premature babies (high rate for that too) at Women’s walk down Airline Highway (61) if they don’t have a car to see their child. The transportation issue happened because Jindal closed down the North Baton Rouge ob/gyn clinic. He is also closing down the public hospital in April which will leave North Baton Rouge, the poorest part of the city, with NO hospital. I only wonder how long it will take for us to have a baby born on the median of this busy 4-lane.
Jindal is creating death panels by depriving the poorest neighborhoods, the ones that did not vote for him, of medical care. Lake is also so far away and has so much congestion, that the gunshot cases are likely to die on the way from North Baton Rouge, the highest murder area. The hospital (Our Lady of the Lake) that is supposed to take over for Earl K. Long, the public hospital, which does have limited public transportation is Catholic and refused to take EKL’s ob/gyn care or the prisoners. So they got to pick and choose. Jindal is Catholic.
