WASHINGTON, Dec 2, 2009 (UPI via COMTEX) -- Full-scale healthcare rationing is
already occurring on Indian reservations in the United States, a U.S. senator
says.
"We've got the 'first Americans' living in third world conditions," Sen. Byron
L. Dorgan, D-N.D., told The New York Times in an article published Wednesday.
Improving healthcare for Native Americans was the subject of meetings in
Washington last month involving leaders of 564 American Indian tribes.
"We're going to have to do more to address disparities in healthcare delivery,"
President Barack Obama told the group.
The healthcare overhaul now being debated in Congress appears poised to bring
the most significant improvements to the Indian health system in decades, the
Times said.
"Indian people have given up a lot," said Dr. Yvette Roubideaux, director of the
Indian Health Service. "They feel like they have, in a sense, prepaid for this
healthcare with loss of land, natural resources, loss of culture."
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