Former CMS Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, Patients, and Providers from Rural Georgia Spotlight Republican Health Care Cuts Forcing Local Hospital to Close Labor & Delivery Unit

Atlanta, GA –– Today, former Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator, Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, joined Georgia physicians and advocates to spotlight how cuts to Medicaid in the Republican tax law are forcing St. Mary’s Sacred Heart Hospital in rural northeast Georgia to close their labor and delivery unit. In Georgia, where access to care is already limited by the state’s extreme abortion ban, women and pregnant patients will have to jump through even more hoops to get the care they need. 

During the event, former CMS Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, Free & Just, Georgia providers, and advocates set the record straight on what’s at stake as Republican health care cuts force hospitals across the country to close their doors.

“There are over 300 rural hospitals that are estimated to be at risk of closing. It really was devastating to hear that St. Mary's Sacred Heart Hospital is shutting down its labor and delivery unit as a result of the cuts of the Republican tax law. Nobody wants to worry that they are going to be delivering their baby on the side of the road,” said Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, former Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator. “People across this country and in Georgia deserve a health care system that is both affordable and accessible. The Republican tax law harms all of us, but this crisis is not inevitable. It is a choice. Republicans in Washington are choosing to side with a handful of billionaires and big corporations instead of protecting the health care that families rely on.”

“I woke up in the middle of the night covered in amniotic fluid and blood, and I was contracting. And all three of us were terrified. We had to drive 30 minutes to the hospital, and I remember how painful every single one of those 30 minutes were. There were several occasions in which I had to drive myself bleeding, leaking amniotic fluid over an hour to seek care. Because of my delay in care, my daughter was born at 27 weeks. It was a very precipitous delivery, and at this point, we had moved to Savannah, where I am a mile from my current hospital,” said Callie Beale Harper, an artist from Savannah,who was forced to go out-of-state for urgent medical care when she was pregnant with twins. “I know the dangers of not being able to receive care, but especially the dangers of not being close to care. The closure means that many women now face the same impossible choices, the same terrifying dangers that I faced, and that my family faced as well.”

“For many of our rural communities, there is no longer any hospital-based obstetric services available, there's no physicians available, there is no labor and delivery unit. For many of these women, they have to travel 30, 60, 90-plus miles to access one of these. And for a woman having an obstetric crisis, an obstetric emergency, 30 minutes can be life or death — 60 minutes absolutely is horrendous. And so it really speaks to how we are not serving the women of Georgia,” said Dr. Lara Hart, a Georgia based Obstetrician-Gynecologist. “Overall, we're not supporting our patients, we're not supporting our communities. I really find it so frustratingly hypocritical for a political party to say that they support families, and they want women to have children, but then they do nothing that actually supports those women in having healthy pregnancies and having good outcomes.”

“If women can't afford to get basic health care, there will be more sickness, more death,” said Dr. Karen Kinsell, the only rural primary care provider in Clay County, Georgia. “I practice in Clay County. There's a thousand people in my town, 3,000 in the county. I know women who've died of prenatal, perinatal deaths. In such a small population. If we, the government, the community, truly care that life is important, then we need to ensure that access to reproductive health care, all health care, is not only legally available, but also financially available, and we need to act on that. And we need to act before this bad-bullshit- bill comes to full fruition.”

Cuts to Medicaid affect all patients’ access to care – not just Medicaid beneficiaries. Republicans in Congress passed drastic health care cuts in the federal budget reconciliation package. These cuts are now forcing hospitals across the country to close their doors, leaving patients without access to the care they need. Republican lawmakers are fueling a nationwide health care crisis, and communities across the country will suffer. 

You can watch the event here. If you are interested in speaking with any of the participants in the press event, or learning more about Free & Just’s work, please contact malachi@freeandjust.us. 

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