Class Action Suit: LSU Illegally Shut Down Charity Hospital : NOLA Indymedia

Today seven New Orleans residents with serious chronic health care conditions filed a class action lawsuit in Criminal District court against LSU over the closure of the city's Charity Hospital.

The lawsuit claims that LSU illegally shut down Charity in October 2005, because it did not have the prior approval of the state legislature, and because it has not subsequently provided replacement health care services at the same level in the region.

Last June the Lousiana Attorney General issued an opinion that a statuatory requirement applicable to Charity Hospital states "No hospital or emergency room may be closed without legislative approval."

Another state statute "prohibits any one of the Charity hospitals from reducing health care services or expenditures by 35 percent. If a reduction of more than 15 percent is contemplated in more than one fiscal year, legislative approval is necessarty" according to information distributed at a press confernce this morning announcing the filing of the lawsuit.

LSU has not received legislative approval on either issue.

At today's press conference in Kingsley House, former Criminal District Court Judge Calvin Johnson said the purpose of the lawsuit is "to make sure the least of us are provided with health care.

"This is not simply about opening the building," Johnson continued. "It's to make sure everyone in the region is provided with health care. This has been a significant obstacle to recovery.

Johnson retired as Chief Judge of the court earler this month to lead the legal team litigating the suit.

According to the statement handed out at the press conference, "This is a class action brought on behalf of more than 100,000 uninsured individuals who have depended on Charity Hospital for treatment of serious medical conditions."

Lower 9th Ward Clinic Director Alice Kearney reported that Charity's "closure has created a negative impact on low income clients. The private sector is ill equipped to provide necessary services. The result is that client's physical and mental health care is compromised. There has been inaction and slow responses at every level. Ultimately, health care delayed is health care denied."

Two New Orleans police officers described how their jobs as crisis intervenors has become more difficult since Charity's closure. Ceil Tabo spoke with a cast on one arm as a result of a recent assault by a chronically mentally il person who is not receiving proper health care now. "It's an epidemic, Tabo said. "There's almost no psychiatric beds now".

City counciler Shelly Midura said that "increasing crime, substance abuse and growing homelessness are indications of lack of health care" in the city since Charity's closure.

It must be stated, however, that Midura did not show the same sensitivity to social ills last month. On December 20 she voted, along with the rest of the Sychophantic Seven on the council, who caved in to the intimidation of HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson, to aggravate the displacement of low income public housing tenants by voting to demolish their homes. Not did she or any of the rest of her gang lift a finger when police brutalized opponents of demolition in and outside of the chambers and sent some to the hospital.

Long time activist Brad Ott, who initiated the campaign to redress the injustices brought on by the closing of Charity, said at the press conference, "I've waited two years for this day. But we can't afford to be complacent now. We have to bring the campaign to the public and the judicial system.

"We have to reopen Charity or provide health care replacement elsewhere. They saved my live. There were more than 150 clinics there, but only 34 now, and they're only open part time. If it hadn't been for the Common Ground and Lower 9th Ward clinics, I don't know what we would've done."

At the end of the press conference Judge Johnson introduced two of the lawsuit's plaintiffs. As those present applauded loudly, one of them, Ronald Newman, wiped tears from his eyes.

A meeting to plan how to mobilize the public to support the lawsuit, and health care for all, will be held this Saturday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Ben Franklin school, 1116 Jefferson Avenue in New Orleans.