BY MARY CLARE JALONICK, Associated Press Writer
Mon Jun 15, 8:56 am ET
CROW AGENCY, Mont. – Ta'Shon Rain Little Light, a happy little girl who loved to dance and dress up in traditional American Indian clothes, had stopped eating and walking. She complained constantly to her mother that her stomach hurt.
When Stephanie Little Light took her daughter to the Indian Health Service clinic in this wind-swept and remote corner of Montana, they told her the 5-year-old was depressed.
Ta'Shon's pain rapidly worsened and she visited the clinic about 10 more times over several months before her lung collapsed and she was airlifted to a children's hospital in Denver. There she was diagnosed with terminal cancer, confirming the suspicions of family members.
A few weeks later, a charity sent the whole family to Disney World so Ta'Shon could see Cinderella's Castle, her biggest dream. She never got to see the castle, though. She died in her hotel bed soon after the family arrived in Florida.
"Maybe it would have been treatable," says her great-aunt, Ada White, as she stoically recounts the last few months of Ta'Shon's short life. Stephanie Little Light cries as she recalls how she once forced her daughter to walk when she was in pain because the doctors told her it was all in the little girl's head.
Ta'Shon's story is not unique in the Indian Health Service system, which serves almost 2 million American Indians in 35 states.
On some reservations, the oft-quoted refrain is "don't get sick after June," when the federal dollars run out. It's a sick joke, and a sad one, because it's sometimes true, especially on the poorest reservations where residents cannot afford health insurance. Officials say they have about half of what they need to operate, and patients know they must be dying or about to lose a limb to get serious care.
( Read the rest here. )
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China's US bond holdings drop first time in 11 months in April
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Mainland China's holdings of US Treasury bonds fell for the first time in 11 months to 763.5 billion dollars in April, US government data showed Monday.
The April figure, a drop from March's 767.9 billion dollars, was the lowest since the holdings started building up in June 2008, the US Treasury said in its monthly international capital data report.
The figures do not include the holdings of Hong Kong, China's special administration region, which climbed to 80.9 billion dollars in April from 78.9 billion dollars the previous month.
But the latest statistics showed China sitting comfortably as the top holder of Treasury bonds despite years of trying to diversify its reserves away from the US dollar.
Japan is the second-largest holder of US bonds, at 685.9 billion dollars in April.
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