HOUSE JOINT MEMORIAL 14

47th legislature - STATE OF NEW MEXICO - first session, 2005

INTRODUCED BY

Ray Begaye

A JOINT MEMORIAL

URGING THE UNITED STATES CONGRESS TO INCREASE FUNDING FOR URBAN INDIAN HEALTH SERVICES IN ORDER TO AVERT A CRISIS FOR ALL NEW MEXICO TAXPAYERS.

     WHEREAS, a shortfall of five million dollars ($5,000,000) in the federal Indian health service budget has already resulted in a severe cutback in health care services to the approximately fifty thousand Native Americans living in New Mexico's urban centers; and

     WHEREAS, of the nearly fifty thousand Native Americans residing in the Albuquerque metropolitan area, approximately seventy percent are uninsured; and

     WHEREAS, requests for emergency appropriations from the United States congress have been deferred due to the high cost of supporting the war in Iraq; and

     WHEREAS, cutbacks in Indian health services will affect other health care providers and facilities, as deserving patients no longer being served by the Indian health service will seek services elsewhere; and

     WHEREAS, New Mexico's congressional representatives have already written to urge the federal Indian health service to provide stable and reliable funding for Indian health services, particularly since inadequate funding may force closure of the Albuquerque Indian health center, leaving an estimated seventeen thousand Albuquerque residents without access to the health care promised them in treaty and in law; and

     WHEREAS, the country's obligation to fund services for native peoples deprived of their lands and traditional ways is founded in treaty, statute, constitution and ethics; and

     WHEREAS, the health care needs of Native Americans persist whether or not they reside on reservations where health care is more reliable; and

     WHEREAS, funding for urban Indian health services comprises only one percent of the Indian health service budget, although an estimated sixty percent of all Indians live away from tribal land; and

     WHEREAS, the Indian health service, prior to funding cuts, spent an estimated one thousand nine hundred twenty dollars ($1,920) per patient, which is less than half of that paid for veterans, for federal prisoners or for medicare recipients; and      WHEREAS, Native American women are now reported, in the American Journal of Public Health, to suffer the highest percentage of mental disorders in the world; and

     WHEREAS, the accident rate is seven times higher in the Native American population than in other populations in the United States; and

     WHEREAS, both the diabetes and the tuberculosis rates of Native Americans in Albuquerque rank fifth in the country, and the alcoholism rate ranks second; and

     WHEREAS, the suicide rate for Native Americans is almost double that of other Americans, at just over twenty per one hundred thousand population; and

     WHEREAS, nearly one-quarter of Native Americans living in Albuquerque live at or below the poverty level and over half live in single-parent families;

     NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO that the New Mexico congressional delegation be requested to urge the United States congress to adequately fund the Indian heath service to ensure that the urban Indian population of New Mexico is treated for accidents and persistent health problems so that other state facilities will not need to absorb the millions of dollars in treatment expenses left unfunded; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that copies of this memorial be transmitted to the governor, the secretary of health, the Navajo Nation, the all Indian pueblo council, the members of New Mexico's congressional delegation, the federal secretary of health and human services and the director of the federal Indian health service.

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