Most people leave doctor visits with prescriptions, but still feel unsure—instructions make sense, but no one asks about their life. In contrast, when a provider knows your name, remembers your story, and explains care in a way that fits you, the experience feels different—and that difference matters.
For over a month, my office has been going back and forth with ICE officials about Andrea's condition. We have been ignored, put off, and frankly, lied to about the treatment she has received while in detention.
Guadalupe's strength waned as she sadly watched videos and photos of her husband, Jesus Juarez Cruz. Her cell phone grew heavier in her hand as memories flashed by: a joyful, strong, active Jesus playing with his granddaughter. All of that has vanished.
"Offering science- and research-based health care to transgender and gender diverse youth is part of Children's Minnesota's vision of being every family's essential partner in raising healthier children."
What are scientists, clinicians, and public health practitioners supposed to do in this moment? What use is research when our patients might be deported tomorrow? Why try to stem the tide of outbreaks when the world has fallen apart? This is why: because even in these times, enlarging the scope of human knowledge matters. The search for cures still matters. The fate of individual patients still matters.
If you're smoking three packs of cigarettes a day, should you expect society to pay when you get sick?" He added that while Americans would always have the right to "eat donuts all day," nevertheless, "should you then expect society to care for you when you predictably get very sick at the same level as somebody who was born with a congenital illness?
Everything is changing, and in the face of that, America is failing. Over 90,000 souls have paid for our failing. Millions more are living in terror for their livelihoods and their families. But Covid-19 isn't a technology problem, or a science question, or a supply chain issue, or even a question of doctoring. This challenge is public health, and that is something we've been failing at for a damn long time.
Adult literacy advocate Toni Cordell recounts the story of feeling comforted when her doctor told her that her medical concern could be solved with an easy surgery. She agreed to proceed without asking further questions and didn't understand the medical consent forms because she didn't read well. At a follow-up office visit a couple of weeks after the procedure, Cordell was shocked when the nurse asked, "How are you feeling since your hysterectomy?"
