More Letters to the Editor Fun

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette ran an article on September 9 about an undocumented worker by the pseudonym of Juan Carlos Serrano. Serrano landed in the United states via Guatemala at the age of 17 seeking what most undocumented workers seek – a job that pays enough to help pull himself and his family out of poverty. He purchased a new name and social security number and landed in Pittsburgh with a job that paid enough money for him be able to send funds home to build a home for his family and himself. In April of 2005 he lost his arm in an accident (he was hit by a Port Authority train) and was taken to Mercy Hospital for treatment.

There have been only two letters to the editor responding directly to the article and both were stunningly unsympathetic. One writer complained that the Post-Gazette was being dishonest by referring to Serrano as “Mr. Serrano” instead “this illegal alien” (did he come from a different planet?), and was horrified that the patients of Mercy hospital were “subsidizing treatment for someone who is not intelligent enough to know that walking in front of a train is hazardous to your health” (thus implying that stupid people did not deserve medical treatment). He closed with a variation of the classic “liberals are stupid” canard.

The second writer wanted to know why neither the Mercy Hospital nor the Post Gazette reported Serrano to the INS.

So, for the edification of both writers, I am going to say this very slowly:

Mercy
Hospital
is a
Catholic
Institution.

I am a seriously lapsed Catholic and will most likely not voluntarily set foot in a Catholic church again in my lifetime (barring the weddings, funerals and baptisms of friends/family). I have some serious and significant issues with the way the hierarchy treats the laity. But the Catholic hospitals (reproductive issues aside) have long lead other medical institutions in treating the poor, the infirm, the illegal immigrants of the United States. It is part of the fucking mission of Mercy Hospital to treat undocumented/illegal workers such as Serrano, along with anyone else carried through the emergency room doors.

Be advised that I am not painting institutions such as Mercy Hospital as shining examples of health care. The trend towards Catholic hospitals taking over their secular counterparts and cutting reproductive services (refusing to administer EC to female rape victims A. at all or B. who are ovulating, refusing to perform vasectomies or tie a woman's tubes, etc) is distressing as it imposes a very specific and restrictive set of beliefs on patients who may not share those beliefs. Such as myself.

So it is unsurprising that Mercy Hospital would treat a stupid, illegal “alien” and elect not to turn him over to the INS. Because that would run counter to the mission of the hospital and the church.