Demonstrators gathered in Wytheville Feb 23 to call on Congress to finish work on the budget and fund health care.
Holding signs urging passing motorists to “Honk for Healthcare” and calling for “Healthcare for All,” members of Virginia Organizing’s emerging Wytheville Chapter and leaders from the New River Valley chapter and other parts of Southwest Virginia gathered in front of the Brock Hughes Medical Center.
Organizers said they are fighting for everyone and call quality, affordable and equitable healthcare for everyone. They want legislators to lower the price of prescription Medicaid, close the Medicaid coverage gap and make private insurance, child care and other services more affordable.
Those demonstrating said they chose to stand in front of the Brock Hughes center because the clinic does its best to make sure everyone who wants healthcare gets it, and because its Monroe Street location is highly visible.
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Georgia Randall worked as a nurse for 34 years and said she knows first-hand how healthcare is not always equal and how the costs can devastate patients and families. Through her work as an ICU and emergency room nurse, and as an administrator, she said she has seen how people with good insurance and money have a different set of healthcare available to them.
“The continuity isn’t there,” she said. “Healthcare is a right, not a privilege, and it needs to be equitable for everybody.”
For information on Virginia Organizing, visit the group’s website at www.virginia-organizing.org or the group’s Facebook page.
To reach reporter Millie Rothrock, call 276-228-6611, ext. 573, or email mrothrock@wythenews.com.