Health care overhaul could boost economy
A national health care plan covering all Americans would give an economic boost to Beckley, Raleigh County and all other areas of West Virginia that have hospitals and other medical facilities.
In Raleigh County it�s medicine, not coal mining, education or Wal-Mart, that�s already the biggest employer. If the 250,000 West Virginians now without health insurance and another 150,000 who are uninsured (Sen. Jay Rockefeller�s figures) acquire health insurance, medical clinics, hospitals and other types of health centers would be forced to hire more personnel.
For Beckley that would mean institutions like Mountain State University would see a new influx of students seeking various types of medical education required for jobs at clinics, Appalachian Regional and Raleigh General hospitals and physical therapy centers. In turn, the hospitals might be forced to build new wings to accommodate more patients.
Local businesses would benefit as more people seeking medical treatment would be coming to our city, eating in its many restaurants, sleeping at our hotels and motels, going to movies, shopping in our stores, trading cars, buying gas.
But there is one major problem: Will there be enough physicians to handle the influx of new patients? Indeed, Raleigh County would be a very unhealthy place to live if all of its fine foreign-born doctors packed up and went back to their native lands.
Jim Wood
Beckley
Some areas of state still waiting for water
I am so happy to see the grants being provided for water to towns that need it. But, I have a home outside Pax, in Fayette County, that has never had water and doesn�t look like it will get funds to put through our area, Town Creek.
I am within walking distance of homes who have Pax city water, but apparently because we are across the turnpike, Paint Creek and railroad tracks, we are forced to live in the 19th century.
How can you attract folks to move there to the beauty of the hollows when they have to live without the basic necessities? I want to live in my great-great-great grandparents� old home, and I don�t think water is too much to ask.
The turnpike took part of our property years ago when built, now they refuse to provide access. If the cities won�t provide the water to these areas (people farther away DO get water, they are just on the other side), then I believe that someone should give money to provide and contain well and spring water that might be available. This is one of the reasons why West Virginia is ridiculed by people outside the state.
I live in Orlando and people cannot believe that we don�t have water. The grants that are being given are far more than would be required to provide the lines for us. Why is Fayette County always left out?
JoAnne Lively Davis
Orlando, Fla
