Reznet

Indian Health Bill Advocate Still Hopeful

By Kevin Abourezk

Rachel Joseph isn't ready to give up.

For nearly a decade, the Lone Pine Paiute-Shoshone has been fighting for reauthorization of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act.

"We've been at it for nine years," said Joseph, co-chair of the National Steering Committee for the Reauthorization of the IHCIA. "I need to remain optimistic that it's going to get done real soon."

But in all reality, it looks like another year will end without federal lawmakers passing the much-needed legislation that would expand and improve delivery of health care to Native people.

But Joseph isn't ready to give up. What drives her? 

That's easy.

Stories like that of Ta'Shon Rain Littlelight, a 5-year-old Crow girl from Montana who died in her mother's arms the night before she was to see Cinderella's Castle at Disney World because her cancer was not diagnosed early.

Stories like that of Avis Littlewind, a 14-year-old girl who lay for 90 days curled up in a fetal position on her bed before killing herself because no treatment center existed on her reservation to help her.

Victims of a failing Indian Health Service.

Two Native youth whose lives' tragic lessons will once again go unheeded.

For at least another year.

Who must we convince that Indian health care legislation is a life-or-death proposition?

Is our health to be no more than a political tool used to perpetuate decades-old arguments like abortion?

Who will stand up for us in the coming year?

Jacqueline Johnson Pata, executive director of the National Congress of American Indians, doesn't think Congress is likely to take up consideration of the IHCIA before the end of the year. That means advocates for the legislation will have to completely start over in the coming year to gain passage of the act, despite having won its passage in the Senate this year.

"Once again, we're going to have to do a lot of work to get it through," she said.

But hope remains.

Joseph sees it in the election of Barack Obama, a co-sponsor of the IHCIA in the Senate.

She sees it in his appointment of former South Dakota Sen. Tom Daschle, a longtime friend to Native people, to secretary of health and human services.

"We anticipate the hurdles we had to make in the last administration should not be there," she said, diplomatically referring to President George W. Bush's failed efforts to stop the IHCIA in the Senate.

But she also knows hurdles remain, including the teetering economy and Obama's own stated plans to revamp the country's health care system. When will Obama find time to address Indian health care with so many other pressing problems to address? she wonders.

But Joseph isn't ready to give up this year. Not just yet.

She recently helped draft a paper that lays out reasons Congress should attach the IHCIA to economic stimulus legislation it is currently considering. The committee she co-chairs sent the language to Obama's transition team in the hopes they would work to attach it to the economic stimulus legislation, she said.

"If that doesn't happen, then we need to start all over," she said.

We can only hope those who have championed the Indian health bill will continue their good fight should it come to that.

We can only hope Joseph isn't ready to give up.

Kevin Abourezk's "Red Clout" columns are available for syndication. Please contact reznet to purchase republishing rights.

Kevin Abourezk, Rosebud Lakota, is a reporter and editor at the Lincoln (Neb.) Journal Star. He writes reznet's "Red Clout" political blog and teaches reporting at the Freedom Forum's American Indian Journalism Institute. Abourezk was awarded a Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism in 2006.

To send Kevin Abourezk a message please click here