The Power To Make Quality Healthcare More Accessible
Kim Hunt is Executive Director of Pride Action Tank, a project of AIDS Foundation Chicago.
By Kim Hunt
The phone rang early on August 12, 2003. I have always been the one to make the calls from Chicago to my family in Kansas City, so I knew this was bad. I learned my sister, Rhonda, was found dead in her bed, and it was her middle school-aged kids who found her. An hour later, my mother and brother called me with the news.
Rhonda had four kids. My oldest niece was born when my sister was 17. The other three, a set of twin boys and a girl who came a year after them, were born about 10 years later. Four kids, a high school education and a brief marriage made an economically challenging life for my sister who was an overworked, under-paid teaching assistant for much of her career.
She’d suffocated in her pillow as the result of an epileptic seizure in the middle of the night. Ever since she was a baby, epileptic seizures were an on-again, off-again part of her life. The one that led to her death, just after her 40th birthday, was the result of years of revolving hospital doors, primary care doctors, tests, new and re-diagnoses, and new medications with trial dosages that are typical of the uninsured.
Just recently, March 23, 2022, marked the 12th anniversary of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which has made health insurance obtainable for millions of people in this country. Though the ACA came too late for Rhonda, her story gives me the power to change the narrative for those who face similar challenges and ensure access to quality affordable health care.
Her story inspires my advocacy for the current HB4430/SB3209 legislation, which increases access to two
highly effective methods of HIV preventative healthcare, and my efforts to support marginalized and underrepresented individuals.
““Though the ACA came too late for my sister Rhonda, her story gives me the power to change the narrative for those who face similar challenges and ensure access to quality affordable health care. Her story inspires my advocacy for the current HB4430/SB3209 legislation.” — Kim Hunt @prideactiontank #PowerToChangeStories”
Kim Hunt is Executive Director of Pride Action Tank, a project of AIDS Foundation Chicago. https://prideactiontank.org/ ; @PrideActionTank ; https://www.aidschicago.org/ .