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COURIER LIFE, M M BR B G ARCH 15–21, 2019 27
DON’T TOUCH: Brooklynites protested proposed cuts to the
state’s Medicaid budget at a rally outside Brookdale Hospital.
Photo By Steve Solomonson
A healthy
opposition
Locals rally against state’s
proposed Medicaid cuts
BY NATALLIE ROCHA
Hundreds of Brooklynites rallied outside a Brownsville
hospital to protest proposed multi-million-dollar
cuts to the state’s Medicaid system.
Locals, staff at Brookdale Hospital, and members
of health-care workers’ union 1199 SEIU gathered
outside the medical center to demand Gov. Cuomo
keep his hands off the more than $550 million he
may siphon from the system, in order to balance a
state-budget defi cit created after President Trump
and other Republican politicians in Washington,
DC, rewrote the federal tax code in 2017 .
“We can’t put a price on people’s health,” said
Khari Edwards, Brookdale Hospital’s vice president
of external affairs. “Our rallying cry was: ‘No more
cuts! No cuts!’”
Edwards joined roughly 1,140 demonstrators at
the rally outside the hospital near Rockaway Parkway
and Linden Boulevard, including Borough
President Adams, New York City Comptroller Scott
Stringer, Councilwoman Alicka Ampry-Samuel (DEast
Flatbush), and the head of the Greater New
York Hospital Association, who warned Cuomo’s
proposed cuts would slash medical services offered
to some of the borough’s most vulnerable residents,
and potentially force some care providers to shutter.
“Our message is simple: no health-care cuts,”
said Kenneth Raske. “New York’s safety-net hospitals
have already been cut to the bone, and cannot
absorb them. If these cuts happen, many hospitals
would curtail vital services — and some would close
their doors for good. Tens of thousands of healthcare
workers would lose their jobs.”