borhood goes to a hospital in one of the wealthier districts, they are usually treated in such a way that they don't feel welcome. One nurse who has been working in the South Bronx for five years tells Kozol, "As bad as Lincoln or Bronx-Lebanon may be, at least receptionists don't call a woman of color by her first name. And some of the nurses and housekeepers talk to you! If a woman's black, Hispanic, and on welfare, maybe a drug user, or has HIV, she knows she isn't welcome in a first-class hospital. This is not perception. It's a fact. If they wouldn't want you as a neighbor, why do you think they'd want you in the next bed?" (p. 175-176) And for those few that actually do get admitted to a facility in the higher income districts, they are placed on "special" floors dedicated to Medicaid patients. "On the fifth floor of Mount Sinai Medical Center, a distinguished private hospital, according to the paper, 17 newborn babies are placed in a row in front of a window in the obstetric ward. All are white. One flight down, in the fourth-floor nursery, are 14 other babies- 'all black or Latino.' The fifth floor, supposedly reserved for private patients, offers 'private and semiprivate rooms with bathrooms.' On the fourth floor, black and Hispanic women are assigned, four each, to 'overcrowded rooms' with 'peeling paint' and 'showers in the hallways.' Patients on the fifth floor are given classes in nutrition, exercise, breast-feeding, and infant care, which, says a nurse, are not provided to the patients on the fourth floor. On the fifth floor a nurse is instructed not to document the fact of alcohol abuse in making out a patient's record. On the fourth floor, in contrast, 'nursesnote for the records a mother's drug or alcohol abuse' and notify welfare officials if a mother uses drugs." (p. 177) Education is also in a severe predicament in this area. With major overcrowding, students find themselves trying to learn while ja...
