Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
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A Little-known Civil Rights Victory
Power to Heal is an hour-long public television documentary that tells a poignant chapter in the historic struggle to secure equal and adequate access to healthcare for all Americans. Central to the story is the tale of how a new national program, Medicare, was used to mount a dramatic, coordinated effort that desegregated thousands of hospitals across the country in a matter of months. Before Medicare, disparities in access to hospital care were dramatic. Less than half the nation's hospitals served black and white patients equally, and in the South, 1/3 of hospitals would not admit African-Americans even for emergencies. Using the carrot of Medicare dollars, the federal government virtually ended the practice of racially segregating patients, doctors, medical staffs, blood supplies and linens. Power to Heal illustrates how Movement leaders and grass-roots volunteers pressed and worked with the federal government to achieve justice and fairness for African-Americans. Through the voices of the men and women who experienced disparities and fought against them, Power to Heal will introduce a broad, primetime national audience on PBS to a missing link in the Civil Rights Movement -- a struggle over healthcare from a half-century ago, that raises questions that resonate today: is healthcare a human right? Must the federal government intervene to ensure equality? |
View Recent Press "Medicare's Civil Rights Roots," U.S. News & World Report "Desegregation: The Hidden Legacy of Medicare," U.S. News & World Report "Fifty Years ago Medicare Helped to Desegregate Hospitals," NPR "Medicare and the Desegregation of American Hospitals," Forbes |
Tales of Risk, Danger and Unsung Bravery
Through moving first-hand accounts, we see conditions across the country as the Civil Rights Movement begins to take shape. Physicians, civil rights leaders, and historians recall dramatic incidents and desperate conditions of black families.
Our interviewees recount the dangerous tasks of documenting egregious incidents; tracking down patients; and the risks of blacks and whites working together to put desegregated structures in place.
Drawing on the experiences of actors from all levels of the federal bureaucracy, we feel the sense of urgency that infused the hospital inspection program -- a determination to seize the opportunity to compel hospitals to voluntarily desegregate in order to receive Medicare funds.
Here are some of interviews speaking to the impact of segregated hospital care, the obstacles facing hospital inspectors, and the importance of President Johnson's leadership in the effort to desegregate U.S. hospitals.
Through moving first-hand accounts, we see conditions across the country as the Civil Rights Movement begins to take shape. Physicians, civil rights leaders, and historians recall dramatic incidents and desperate conditions of black families.
Our interviewees recount the dangerous tasks of documenting egregious incidents; tracking down patients; and the risks of blacks and whites working together to put desegregated structures in place.
Drawing on the experiences of actors from all levels of the federal bureaucracy, we feel the sense of urgency that infused the hospital inspection program -- a determination to seize the opportunity to compel hospitals to voluntarily desegregate in order to receive Medicare funds.
Here are some of interviews speaking to the impact of segregated hospital care, the obstacles facing hospital inspectors, and the importance of President Johnson's leadership in the effort to desegregate U.S. hospitals.
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Peter Libassi, Director of the Office for Civil Rights in the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, responsible for overseeing the hospital desegregation inspection campaign in coordination with the Office for Equal Health Opportunity. In this clip, he recalls President Johnson's unwavering dedication to use Medicare funds to desegregate the hospitals. |
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Dr. Alvin Poussaint, now on the faculty of the Harvard Medical School, answered the call of Bob Moses to come South to provide medical care for civil rights workers and to local people, many who had never seen a doctor, and to document segregation and discrimination and help organize to do something about it. In this clip, explains the psychological toll on African American patients of the segregated healthcare system. |
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A Social Security officer who inspected hospitals for civil rights violations in preparation for the roll-out of Medicare discusses amusing and harrowing moments in the field. |
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Phyllis Cunningham, R.N., a volunteer and staff member with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the Medical Committee for Human Rights, discusses training federal inspectors to find civil rights violations in hospitals, and the treacherous ways in which some hospitals sought to deceive inspectors. |
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Dr. Aaron Shirley was the first black resident at the University of Mississippi Medical Center and at one point in the early 60s was the only black pediatrician in Mississippi. In this clip, he recalls his experience as a patient in a segregated ward. |
Power to Heal is in part funded by...
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