Indian Health Service's chastised by Senators

[Thunderwolf, MSN, RN]

Two U.S. senators chastised national Indian Health Service leaders for not seeking needed funding and "rationing" health care in Indian Country.

Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., who is on the committee, said he is "outraged" by the Indian Country tenet of "don't get sick after June" because there won't be money to pay for services that are not a threat to life or limb.

"Those treaties promised that in exchange for millions of acres of land and vast amounts of natural resources, our government would use some of the money it earns from those lands to provide American Indians with adequate health care, housing, education and economic development necessary to sustain quality lives," Tester said.

"Everybody in this room knows that over the past several hundred years, the government has failed to tell the truth to Indians, cheated Indians and failed to fulfill the promises it made many years ago."

Read the complete article: http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles/2007/08/16/news/state/28-money_x.txt