Public Health Crisis: According to this CNN story public hospitals are in crisis, even the famous ones. The article goes on in great detail about long waits for treatment, pharmacy lines that "begin at dawn," etc, and blames recent cuts in government funding. But charity hospitals (both public and private) have been in trouble for a very long time. In the 1990's when HMO's become popular and the reimbursement power balance became heavily weighted toward the third party payer - be it an insurance company or the government, the number of charity care hospitals rapidly declined. Cities had to give up, Catholic orders had to give up. They could no longer charge the well-off enough to compensate for the charity care. In my city, there is no more public hospital, and no more Catholic hospitals, either (except in name only.) It's been that way since at least the mid-'90's. They're run as not-for-profits now. And they're run by businessmen rather than nuns and city counsels. The Parkland story is just the last gasps of that saga.