Statistics on the Indian Health Service (IHS) from the essay 'The Erasure of Indigenous People in Chronic Illness' by Jen Deerinwater:
only healthcare available to Native Americans living on reservations comes from the Indian Health Service (IHS), which is consistently rated the worst healthcare provider in the U.S.
it is also underfunded and there are not enough healthcare clinics or hospitals available, forcing Native Americans to travel far distances for specialised care or to simply not seek treatment at all.
The IHS adheres to the Hyde Amendment, which makes reproductive healthcare 'virtually unavailable', as it bars people from funding for abortions unless it is a case of rape, incest or the pregnancy is endangering the pregnant person's life.
above point is particularly alarming, since around 84% of Native women are abused in their lifetimes, with more than 50% being raped. Homicide rates for Native women on some reservations are 10 times the national homicide rate.
There are almost no sexual assault nurse examiners on site at the IHS centres and rape kits are rarely collected.
There is also historic abuse by the IHS against Native peoples, for example, the forced sterilization of between 25 and 50 percent of those with wombs while in IHS hospitals during the 1970s.
Only 1% of the IHS budget is allocated to urban healthcare despite 7/10 Natives living in or near cities.
The author explains that all of the above is even worse when considering that Native Americans experience the 'highest rates of suicide, diabetes, autoimmune diseases, heart disease, murder and alcohol and drug abuse'. In other words, despite being the group of people most at risk of significant health problems, Natives are also the most likely to receive inadequate care or no care at all.
- The Erasure of Indigenous People in Chronic Illness, Jen Deerinwater (Disability Visibility, Alice Wong, pp.49/50)
