Health Care
The Texas Observer’s Best Features of 2018
Six Stories About Rural Texas You Should Read Before 2018 Ends
From the shuttering of Dairy Queens, driver's license offices and rural hospitals across the state to an only-in-Texas alligator tale, you may have missed this great reporting.
I understand if the wild and weird news cycle of 2018 has got your head spinning. This rollercoaster ride of state and national politics has some reporters near...Read More
‘How Can You Do This to People?’: After Rural Hospitals Close in Milam County, Residents Scramble to Find Care
Little River Healthcare shuttered two Milam County hospitals after falling on hard financial times. Now residents are struggling to find care.
Shan Wilson’s surgery will have to wait. The 64-year-old retired Marine was scheduled to have his prostate removed in early January at the only hospital in Ro...Read More
Four Texas Abortion Court Cases to Watch in 2019
The lawsuits could eventually end up at the Supreme Court, where the future of Roe v. Wade is now in question.
The Texas Legislature’s zeal for passing anti-abortion legislation has created an endless cycle of court challenges that’s frustrated lawmakers and judg...Read More
Meet Jim Allison, Texas’ Newest Nobel Laureate (and Three-Time Cancer Survivor)
The Houston immunologist talks about growing up in small-town Texas, creationism in public schools and what it means to talk about a cure.
Just a few years ago, Jim Allison was considered something of a “snake oil salesman” by other cancer researchers. The ruddy-faced, scraggly-haired scientist...Read More
Struggling Rural Hospitals Say They’re Being Preyed Upon by Blue Cross Blue Shield
Hospital administrators throughout Texas say the insurance company is using “strong-arm” tactics to push unfavorable contracts.
It’s hard to keep a hospital running in Iraan, a dusty community of 1,229 people in the middle of the West Texas oil patch. In the 2017 fiscal year, Iraan Gen...Read More
Texas’ Uninsured Rate for Kids, Highest in the Country, Increased for the First Time in Years
More than 20 percent of all uninsured kids in the country live in Texas, according to a new report.
Even as Republicans boast of a strong economy and low unemployment, the United States has taken unprecedented steps backward in health insurance coverage for ki...Read More
Meet the Scientist and Autism Dad Who’s Fighting the Anti-Vaccine Movement
Peter Hotez predicts deadly measles outbreaks in Texas if the growing trend of nonmedical vaccine exemptions continues.
Peter Hotez didn’t expect the anti-vaccine movement to get so personal. Now dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in ...Read More
Trump’s Sabotage of ACA Enrollment Is Particularly Dangerous in Texas
The attacks on enrollment outreach come as Texas’ uninsured rate increased last year to more than 17 percent — the highest since 2014.
Illustration/Sunny Sone On a dreary day in late September, Ana Maria Garza Cortez stood in front of a hotel conference room full of worn-out community health wo...Read More
In the Rio Grande Valley, New Citizens Turn Out to Vote for the First Time
A nonprofit in Brownsville is seeing more immigrants signing up for citizenship classes this year, and more exercising their new right to vote.
Fifty-one-year old Sandra Cantu had never voted before today. Originally from Matamoros, Mexico, Cantu has lived for the last 30 years in Brownsville, just over...Read More