Sandy Shelter Shock: Capitalism’s Murderous Dysfunction

Bronx, NY. I had signed up with the NY State medical volunteer corps a week before, but they were demanding minimum 12-hour shifts, making it impossible for a working MD to participate. Only now, after a week, was it possible to make one’s own hours.

When I arrived, I saw the vast floor covered with wall-to-wall cots, including many children and the elderly, as well as a wall of cages for pet cats and dogs. People lined up to see me in small numbers, since no general announcement of my availability was made.

Of those I spoke to, nearly all came from Far Rockaway, 24 miles away, with a few from the burned-out houses of Breezy Point, Queens. Some had lived in Redfern public housing, 14 buildings where there is still no heat or electricity. Others were renters in low-lying homes or apartments and had lost all their possessions.

Since the storm they had been moved three times, from Queens College to York College to this shelter in the Franklin Armory in the Bronx. This afternoon, they were suddenly told they’d be moving again today, but no one would tell them where. As one elderly white woman said, “they treat us like criminals, not victims.” They had not had access to medical care for the last five days.

I saw patients at my table in full public view, with no way to do anything except take a blood pressure or listen to a chest (identical to my experience in villages in occupied Palestine.) Everyone had lists or bottles of prescriptions that had run out, for high blood pressure, diabetes, or mental health. Of the six insulin-requiring diabetics, only one had been told that there was a refrigerator where her insulin could be kept.

One elderly diabetic, whose Medicaid had been cut off, had no way of paying for her medication. After receiving no help from the shelter staff, a young volunteer lawyer managed to find a pharmacy three miles away that would fill her prescription, but there was no way to pick it up. Two others needed to go to the hospital for evaluation. But since there was no transportation, an ambulance had to be called for one, and I provided taxi fare for another. A social worker was scheduled to come in two days, when these residents would be gone.

There were two large cases of medical equipment, over-the-counter medicines, and some dressings, left by some agency. However, patients in need of more advanced supplies, like nebulizers or apnea machines, had no access to them. As I was getting ready to leave, passing around Motrin, Tylenol and what CHALLENGES I had, more patients asked to be seen.

While all this was going on, the place was packed with politicians, representatives of the Salvation Army in fancy dress, and a Turkish news agency. I demanded to speak to someone who could actually solve particular problems. Eventually I got filmed telling Scott Stringer, Manhattan’s Borough President, that there had to be a general policy that insurance companies could not refuse to pay for medications being refilled before their “due date,” if they had been lost in the storm. Not one of the bigwigs was able to offer any solution to simple problems like transport to the hospital or pharmacy.

The most helpful person I spoke to was a victim, Ed, who was still working at his job delivering phone books. He was trying to solve everyone’s particular problems, keep people informed, and challenging those in charge. He described how his son had been assigned to a school in Brooklyn, although they lived in the Bronx. They took him there to register with all their belongings in tow, since no secure storage is provided.

The next day the Department of Education (DOE) told him to switch his son to a school in the Bronx, and now they are moving again. The DOE threatens parents with ACS (child removal services) intervention if their child does not show up in school.

Ed also explained that if a family is moved to a hotel, they are given $2,000 to spend, which may last for 10 or so days. They can then look for an apartment, and if they find one and qualify for FEMA assistance, they may stay for 3-18 months. The $2,000 hotel allowance was deducted from the rental assistance. There is no assurance that most will be able to find a temporary or permanent residence.

Another family told of being awarded a FEMA grant which could not be directly deposited because of their bank’s malfunction. It was sent to their abandoned address. FEMA then refused to stop payment and redeposit the amount, saying the family would have to wait for the check to be returned.

Everyone in the shelter, black, Latino or white, was poor. It was clear that capitalism does not wish to take care of the working class. Racism is used to divide us in neighborhoods, schools and work, to super-exploit black and Latino workers, and to make invisible, the suffering during natural and man-made disasters. In this shelter, residents were getting along together, but their overwhelming individual problems and their constant motion made it difficult for them to protest.

Ed, like many others, agreed the system has to go. They see the murderous dysfunction of capitalism and its servant politicians. Many took CHALLENGE and we will get to know them and win them to fight for revolutionary change. We need to fight for a new world organized around workers’ needs, not the profits of a few.

Red Doc