An outcry by patients and community groups to persuade University of Chicago medical center officials to keep the university’s Women’s Health Center open hasn’t been successful.
An outcry by patients and community groups to persuade University of Chicago medical center officials to keep the university’s Women’s Health Center open hasn’t been successful.
The University of Chicago Hospitals said it had to cut $100 million from the hospital’s budget and the women’s clinic, 1301 E. 47th St., which provides services for thousands of Medicaid patients, is a casualty.
It remains open temporarily, two weeks after it was originally slated to shut its door on June 30.
“The University of Chicago has treated our community like a guinea pig since its inception. Now that they are at the forefront of medicine, they want to treat us like we are toxic waste. We as patients need this clinic, and other local clinics cannot handle the dumping the university is planning,” said Deborah Taylor, spokeswoman for Southside Together Organizing for Power. She is also a patient at the women’s clinic.
The Coalition for Healthcare Access Responsibility and Transparency said the closure would devastate the deprived and uninsured, and demanded the university’s president, Robert Zimmer, change his mind.
“He makes the final decision,” said Toussaint Losier, the coalition’s organizer.
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