A statement by our faculty at Columbia and Barnard. More to come. I am behind every word.

I don’t usually endorse quick fixes to societal ills, but here is one: presumptive eligibility for hospital financial assistance would avert billions in medical debt for low-income patients. The IRSnews has been too lax on hospitals since the 60s, but it can change course.

How can we build an economy enabling all people to have what they need to experience wellbeing?

Excited to announce a new Health & Political Economy Project to tackle such questions. Darrick Hamilton Victor Roy, MD PhD

Join us for our 4/2 launch event in NYC! bit.ly/newagendahealth

Afrikaners in S Africa were put in concentration camps by the British decades before they instituted apartheid. Freed US slaves who emigrated to Liberia denied political rights to the native majority. The oppressed in one historical moment can oppress in another.

I learned from @anshelpfeffer's book Bibi how much effort Netanyahu has put into cultivating US cable news personalities, and training to use TV to set the terms of political debate. In the early 80s, he hired coaches to learn TV skills and worked to become their favored guest.

In a recent episode of the Dig, Astra Taylor interviewed Luke Messac on the causes of the United States’ medical debt crisis, and the hospital as a site for labor organizing and mobilization. Their conversation is now available to read as a transcript.
jacobin.com/2024/03/us-med…

My colleague Adaira Landry, MD MEd has a great article on the human costs of medical debt in Forbes:

forbes.com/sites/adairala…

Rest in Power @Howard Hiatt!

Howard Hiatt, champion of global public health and former Harvard dean, dies at 98 bostonglobe.com/2024/03/03/nat… via The Boston Globe

There are authors, like Orwell and Ehrenreich, whose work I try to read every word of. Astra Taylor is on that list, so I was grateful for the chance to write this with her. In the fight against medical debt, public officials can do much more than one-off debt purchases.

An inspired campaign. If you are conflicted, read Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience or King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail or Break the Silence speech on Vietnam. If you think you are a moral person, you have to give a good long look at a tactic that finally gets Biden’s attention.

Have you seen the news of city & state officials announcing medical debt jubilees?

As someone who helped develop this tactic, you'd think I'd be thrilled. I'm not.

For Washington Post Opinions Luke Messac & I break down why public officials can and must do more.
🧵
wapo.st/4bTZJHZ

'I have worked in other war zones. But what I witnessed in Gaza was not war — it was annihilation.' latimes.com/opinion/story/…

I spoke with Astra Taylor on The Dig about the history of medical debt collection, and organizing in the past and present. More a conversation than an interview, thank God, because Astra is a major figure in the story.

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the…

I was born at St Elizabeth’s. Now private equity is trying to hollow it out. Just a perfect take here by Globe’s Brian McGrory:

bostonglobe.com/2024/02/02/bus…

If you like books on audio for long rides and dog walks and cleaning dishes, Your Money or Your Life is now available on Audible and other audiobook sites. I gave them a list of my favorite narrators, but they made me do it.

amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0CRVZ…

If you are in Philly, it would be great to see you this Wednesday (01/24) at 5:30PM at the Penn Bookstore (3601 Walnut St), to talk about medical debt and how we can bring an end to it. Free and open to public.

New open-access paper: We analyzed public comments to the IRS, and found nonprofit hospitals allied with debt collectors in arguing against regulations to protect low-income medical debtors from credit reporting and other aggressive collection actions.

journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00…

Scrolling leaves me in enervated despair these days. If you feel the same, read this instead:

bostonreview.net/articles/the-w…

Jamie and I are headed to Philly on Wednesday, Jan 24 at 5:30PM for a book event for Your Money or Your Life. We'll be at the Penn Bookstore (3601 Walnut St). Would be great to see you there!

eventbrite.com/e/luke-messac-…

There are few people I admire more than the health workers caring for patients in impossible circumstances in Gaza. I feel such nausea and disgust that the tax dollars I earn working as an emergency physician are funding their slaughter.