LATE-NIGHTERS...I'll be back on WGN tonight at 11:30, on the
Patti Vasquez Show. Along with a few other noteworthy Chicagoans I'll be talking about gun violence. You can call in and join the conversation.
 |
| Doctors demand trauma center |
I'm certainly going to take issue with the Univ. of Chicago
getting approval from the State Board to build a new $67 million medical facility in suburban Orland Park. Meanwhile despite months of community protests,
including some by doctors and med students, there is still no Level 1 adult trauma center on the south side to treat victims of gun violence who now must travel miles by ambulance to the North Side or West Side for emergency medical care. The University of Chicago Medical Center closed its adult trauma center in 1988. And though it moved into a new $700 million building last year, officials say the hospital lacks financial and other support to reopen a trauma center that can treat patients 17 and up.
I still remember
Damian Turner, who died of a gunshot wound sustained in a drive-by shooting in 2010. Though the 18-year-old was shot just blocks away from the UC Medical Center, he was taken eight miles away by ambulance to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he died of his injuries, because there are no adult trauma centers on the city's South Side.
 |
| Sen. Durbin knows who butters his bread. |
It's shocking, yet predictable, that
Sen. Dick Durbin won't support the trauma center.
“To say, ‘Let’s go open a trauma center two miles from here’ is not a casual decision. It has to be done very carefully, with a dramatic investment. So I don’t want to push them into something that is not practical,” Durbin said. “I understand the community concerns, because of all the violence and bloodshed, but we need to look at this in honest terms.”
Yes, Sen. Durbin. Let's be honest about where your campaign funds come from, including millions from the medical industry, Blue Cross & Blue Shield, and related PACs and lobbyists. UC is one of
Durbin's biggest patrons. No, I'm not surprised.
I guess I was naive, but I once had such high hopes for Durbin. But then again, I had high hopes for Obama too. A bitter irony is that Palin is actually dead-on accurate when she sneers about "how's that hopey changey stuff working out", but she has no idea why she's right.
ReplyDelete