To the Editor:
Re “Before Being Senator, a Doctor Sued Hundreds of His Patients” (front page, Sept. 9):
Senator Roger Marshall’s lawsuits against his patients during his time as an obstetrician-gynecologist are symptoms of a painful reality: In our country, people’s access to and experience with health care, including reproductive health care, vary widely based on their wealth and income.
From a smaller number of providers in lower-income communities to reduced availability of sex education to the sheer costs associated with health care and insurance, the care that Americans receive is heavily determined by where they live and how much money they make.
There are steps that our elected representatives can take to address these challenges: increase funding for Medicaid, create more community health centers in rural areas and roll back abortion restrictions that reduce access to care and make it harder for providers to do their jobs.
We need leaders who want to reduce these income-based health disparities, not take advantage of them for their own gain.
Julie Burkhart Fort Collins, Colo. The writer is the founder and president of Wellspring Health Access in Casper, Wyo., and an owner of Hope Clinic in Illinois.
To the Editor:
Your article about Roger Marshall, the physician and Republican senator from Kansas who filed more than 700 lawsuits against patients with outstanding bills, reveals the underbelly of a country that has failed to become “great again” for so many Americans.
His patients, some living paycheck to paycheck, subjected to an 18 percent interest rate set by the doctor, and one mother struggling to pay for a $129 postpartum visit — this is the same America whose economic prosperity President Trump boasts about as he promises every adult $5,000 if the Republicans win the midterms.
The lunacy of his proposal and the outrageous insensitivity to the real needs of so many Americans who cannot afford basic medical care should be what sways voters this November, not the bait of a dividend check to celebrate our country’s “tremendous economic success.”
Cathy Bernard New York
Getting Serious About Psychedelic Therapy
To the Editor:
Re “Therapies That Promise Relief Also Pose Risks” (Science Times, Sept. 8):
This article calls attention to the dangers of unregulated psychedelic-assisted treatment and offers a cautionary tale that underscores the need for federal standards that ensure the safe and effective adoption of psychedelic medicine into the American health care system.
The need is urgent. The United States faces a severe mental health crisis among veterans, terminally ill patients, minority communities and others. The current system encourages people to seek psychedelic treatments in foreign countries from unaccredited providers.
I learned the promise of this treatment firsthand as the first participant in a New York University clinical trial studying psilocybin-assisted therapy for alcohol-use disorder, an experience I credit with saving my life. These drugs must be administered in regulated facilities by trained and licensed medical professionals.
President Trump’s April executive order to speed up the development of psychedelic medicine is an opportunity to establish standards. Federal agencies should work together so our health care system can deliver approved psychedelic medicines in accordance with Food and Drug Administration labeling requirements.
Patients deserve treatments that are not only promising but also proved safe and effective.
Jon Kostas New York The writer is the executive director of the Association for Prescription Psychedelics.
Bravo to the Kennedys
To the Editor:
Re “Steeped in Coastal Beauty and Kennedy Memories” (Thursday Styles, Sept. 3):
I was especially drawn to the photo of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in a striped fisherman’s shirt while on Martha’s Vineyard. Did we even know that she and her daughter, Caroline, had more than 330 acres of land there?
This is what class looks like. Instead of selling to the highest bidder to cover the land in McMansions, the Kennedy family sold their beautiful property on Martha’s Vineyard to conservation groups to create the Squibnocket Pond Reservation. They did the right thing, and that is true aristocracy.
Jane Warden Malibu, Calif.
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