Funding New Orleans health centers must be a national priority--HuffPo

[Louisiana1976]

It has been more than four years since Hurricane Katrina devastated the New Orleans region. As we all know, the health care infrastructure was particularly hard hit when Katrina flooded the city and surrounding parishes.

I chaired a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing this week to examine what progress has been made to repair and improve the region's health care infrastructure and highlight the challenges that still remain.

Many important hospitals and outpatient clinics were severely damaged or destroyed. As a result, many of the region's residents have struggled to obtain health care. The city's low-income population often relied on emergency rooms and outpatient clinics as their source of primary care. Charity Hospital, which before Katrina was the major public hospital for the working poor and uninsured, was essentially destroyed and remains shuttered today.

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chairman-ed-towns/funding-new-orleans-healt_b_380737.html