Military Budget Affects Services for People with Disabilities
by Aura Hernández, Oklahoma City, OK
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The current administration is seeking to shrink funding for social programs in the areas of education, the environment, housing and healthcare (especially Medicare/Medicaid), by billions of dollars. Monies set aside for preserving health programs for the aged, poor and disabled will, it appears, be redirected. The federal government budget is being cut in areas that do not correspond to national security while increasing the defense budget. The United States is spending approximately $10 billion a month now on the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is estimated the war will cost more than $94 billion in 2006.
According to the International Peace Research Institute, the United States' 2007 defense budget will total more than the defense budgets for the 32 most developed nations in the world combined. The justification to spend such large quantities of money on defense is national security, and to protect the United States from terrorist and despots that might utilize weapons of mass destruction against us. Unfortunately this takes money away from already under-funded benefits programs for people in the United States who badly need assistance, including people with disabilities. Additional cuts are planned in funds for vocational education, justice and public transportation.
Many people in the U.S. including Latinos, do not have healthcare coverage. Some studies indicate that Latinos are the group receiving the least amount of assistance from the government in terms of social and medical services. Unfortunately, the latest budget includes billions of dollars of cuts to the Medicare and Medicaid programs. It also calls for reductions in funds to offices that support the health of Latinos in the United States including the Office of Minority Health, and programs related to the prevention and cure of illnesses that disproportionately affect Latinos, such as diabetes and heart disease.
Additionally, programs that provide nutritional assistance to elderly people, people who have low-incomes, pregnant women and babies are also slated to cut. So, it is likely that the mortality rate and the rate of people sustaining disabilities related to poor nutrition and lack of health care will go up in the coming years. In this way, many of us are being affected by the billions of dollars being redirected to the defense department. We must organize now to help save these critical social programs.
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