HIV, Queer Identity and the Politics of Health Care
From Poz.com…
There’s so much chaos and confusion in our government today, and the queer community is once again being otherized and demonized. Marking the queer community as evil makes it much easier to dismiss our self-evident rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Moreover, proposed cuts to Medicaid will leave millions of Americans without health insurance. According to a recent study by the Williams Institute at the School of Law at the University of California, Los Angeles, LGBTQ adults are almost twice as likely to be on Medicaid due to disproportionately higher rates of disability and poverty among queer people. These proposed cuts will hurt our community, rendering LGBTQ folks more vulnerable to health problems and preventable diseases, among them HIV. This puts a lot of pressure on HIV service providers to step up and take care of people that the government won’t.
POZ speaks with David Munar, president and CEO of Equitas Health, one of the largest LGBTQ and HIV service providers in the country, and Mardrequs Harris, deputy director for the Southern AIDS Coalition, for their perspective and insight.