Another preventable death

Twelve-year-old Deamonte Driver died in Maryland on Feb. 25 after bacteria from an abscessed tooth spread to his brain. Most reading this story were shocked. How could this be true?

While the acute complications of the infection were rapid, the factors leading to the infection were long-term and preventable.

Over a long period of time Deamonte’s mother, Alyce Driver, had tried to find proper dental care for all of her children. At the time, she was especially focused on finding care for Deamonte’s brother because he had multiple rotting teeth and was constantly reporting his pain.

Her first obstacle was that her jobs in a bakery, construction and home health care did not provide health insurance. Even though she eventually received Medicaid, it was very difficult to find a dentist, and especially to find a dental surgeon who would accept Medicaid and extract Deamonte’s rotting teeth. Eventually she sought assistance from a lawyer with the Baltimore-based Public Justice Center.

When she finally found a surgeon who would extract six of her son’s teeth, she had to cancel the appointment because she did not have the necessary evidence of current Medicaid certification. She suspects that notification of the approval was sent to a homeless shelter where she no longer lived. Days later Deamonte was admitted to a hospital. He died weeks later.

As shocking as this story is, it is representative of a vastly larger problem. Nearly 47 million people in the U.S. have no health insurance and the numbers are growing rapidly. This is 15 percent of the population. Many of those who do have health insurance have no dental insurance.

In the state of Maryland fewer than one in three children in the Medicaid program received any dental services at all in 2005. Those statistics are even worse in the District of Columbia, where more than 70 percent got no treatments in the same year.

Tooth decay is still the single most common childhood disease nationwide. Poor children are more than twice as likely to have cavities as their more affluent peers, and far less likely to get treatment. The lack of transportation, bouts of homelessness and erratic telephone and mail services contribute to poor care. This is especially true of children living in rural areas, who sometimes have to travel hours for dental care. (Washington Post, Feb. 28)

The American Dental Association released a statement on the death of Deamonte Driver. “It is a national disgrace that in the 21st Century America, millions of children don’t have access to basic preventive and restorative dental care. Thousands of these kids suffer from profound dental disease—they can’t eat or sleep properly, can’t pay attention in school because they’re suffering from chronic infections and the resulting constant pain that could have been prevented and easily relieved through treatment.” (http://www.ada.org/)

Every day, the vast majority of people living in this country are experiencing their own horrors trying to find the medical care they need. A recent New York Times/CBS News poll reported, “A majority of Americans say the federal government should guarantee health insurance to every American, especially children.” (New York Times, March 2)

It is revealing that the top two public issues identified by this poll for the 2008 presidential campaign are the Iraq war first and affordable health care second.

Social programs all over the country are being slashed to free up the trillions of dollars needed to carry out this immoral war in Iraq for profits. People in this country are now realizing that this is a war at home as well. The struggle for quality universal health care for all and the struggle to end the war are one.