Quality of Care at King Hospital
The Times’ expose of the abysmal conditions at the medical center in Watts was a chiller--despite the well-known fact that all ghetto institutions are chronically neglected, except the church.
It was noted that relatively low salaries and the fact that the facility is in a dangerous neighborhood are responsible for the lack of quality and quantity in the professionals who staff that hospital. The environs of King/Drew may be more perilous than those of L.A. County/USC Medical Center and Harbor General/UCLA, but is the pay less at King/Drew, also a county facility?
And the conservative majority on the Board of Supervisors had the audacity to contemplate reducing funds for that meager facility. If anything, funding for it should be increased to update antiquated medical equipment and attract quality and disciplined medical professionals. The founding of the Watts-based medical center was a noble undertaking, but what it has turned into would disillusion both Drs. King and Charles Drew if they were alive today.
SHELBY SANKORE
Phillips Ranch
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