Healthcare

BitchPhD has a couple of excellent healthcare issues round-ups:

First, in case you missed it, the Bush administration plans to cut funding for uninsured children. Several states will run out of money for their children's healthcare plans within a few months (I'm pretty sure GA will simply stop enrolling children into the program unless more money magically appears soon).

Second, the FDA plans to shift 30% of the budget allocated for the Office of Women's Health to general use. Oh, and of course, the office of women's health covers children too, because women and children always go hand-in-hand and seem to be the first areas to experience budget cuts.

Third, some companies (including Walmart, I have to admit) are finally coming around to the notion that we're in a healthcare crisis. I'm not convinced that business is the sector to solve the problem, but they can't be any worse than the current federal government (eek! did I just sound like a Republican?).

Fourth:

Twelve-year-old Deamonte Driver died of a toothache Sunday.

A routine, $80 tooth extraction might have saved him.

If his mother had been insured.

If his family had not lost its Medicaid.

If Medicaid dentists weren't so hard to find.

If his mother hadn't been focused on getting a dentist for his brother, who had six rotted teeth.

By the time Deamonte's own aching tooth got any attention, the bacteria from the abscess had spread to his brain, doctors said. After two operations and more than six weeks of hospital care, the Prince George's County boy died.