Clinton drops hospital story from stump speech
(CNN) — Hillary Clinton’s campaign says the candidate will stop telling the story of an uninsured pregnant woman who lost the baby and died after being denied medical care, following a hospital raising questions over its accuracy.
Clinton has frequently told the emotional story of the woman from rural Ohio since late February. In the speech, Clinton said the woman made minimum wage working at a local pizza restaurant, without insurance, when she became pregnant. Clinton said the woman ran into trouble, went to a hospital in a nearby county but was denied treatment because she couldn’t afford a $100 payment. In the speech, Clinton said the woman later was taken to the hospital by ambulance and lost the baby. The young woman was then taken by helicopter to a Columbus hospital where she died of complications.
As recently as Friday night in Grand Forks, North Dakota, Clinton said, “As I was listening to this story being told, I was just aching inside. It is so wrong, in this good, great and rich country, that a young woman and her baby would die because she didn’t have health insurance or a hundred dollars to get examined.”
But an Athens, Ohio hospital is questioning the accuracy of the story. While Clinton never named the hospital in her speech, the woman she was referring to was treated at O’Bleness Memorial Hospital in Athens. The hospital said the woman did indeed have insurance, and at least at their hospital was never turned away.
Hospital chief executive officer Rick Castrop in a statement said, “we reviewed the medical and patient accounts of the patient” after she was named in a newspaper story about Clinton’s stump speech. “There is no indication that she was ever denied medical care at any time, for any reason. We clearly reject any perception that we ever denied any care to this woman.”
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Clinton is an astute politician yet these gaffs continue to plague her campaighn. More than anyone,Hillary should know that major stump speeches need to be vetted for accuracy! How could she keep making these amateur mistakes? Is it her staff or is she becoming desperate? I think it's both..if I were in charge of her campaighn, stump speeches would be heavily vetted and I would rarely have her speak off the record.In the world of politics,these so called "little" things can make or break you!
04-06-2008, 11:29 AM
Clinton drops hospital story from stump speech
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