Back in the day even before my time when you were a person of color or you were poor you couldn’t go to the doctor so one or two things happened. 1) A doctor out of the goodness of his heart would come to the house or 2) you had to do it yourself. My mother was born in the barn because my great-grandfather thought he could do what the doctor could do and delivered a 10lb. baby girl, the baby of course was fine but my grandmother was in a coma for three weeks behind that but she lived and is still kicking at 84 years of age.
So many people today don’t have insurance and no doctors are making house calls to my knowledge. Because of crimes in the inner city and vigilante cops no one is safe from these trigger-happy thugs. In the hood the authorities either don’t come at all when called or show up two deaths too late to save a person on the brink of death. So now 50 plus years later we come to the conclusion “we gotta do it ourselves.”
PCM-Oakland (People’s Community Medics) is a group of concerned citizens in the neighborhood who are members of the Oscar Grant Committee got tired of seeing too many young Black and Brown mostly men but women too losing their lives because either the EMT’s would get there too late or not show up at all.
People’s Community Medics have been trained to do the basic things to save a life enough to get them to the hospital and in some cases have had to load the gun shot/stabbed victim into a car and drive them to the hospital. Thanks to this group of individuals, lives have been saved/spared. Somebody’s family didn’t have to lose a loved one thanks to someone giving a damn.
Sharena Thomas and Leslye Phillips founded PCM; it is a grassroots organization that teaches the basic emergency First Aid skills free of charge.
Are you aware that if the cops show up first that they can refuse a concerned citizen from aiding a person in distress? According to Leslye Phillips they can and in a lot of cases they do. One example of this is what happened in Anaheim, California when the cops at close range shot and killed an unarmed man and allowed him to bleed out. People wanted to help and tried but were viciously attacked by dogs to include children and other family members, so it is best to get there before the cops show up because it can be the difference between life and death.
Leslye also stated that 1 and 5 victims live if they beat the ambulance to the hospital, this being true of gun shot victims.
The People’s Community Medics don’t want to harbor their labor of love and concern for just East Oakland they would like to share the information and training they have received so that not only Oakland be spared but the whole Bay Area and beyond.
Because times are so hard and the economy is still not good, people can live even without insurance. Leslye and a few members of their group stopped by POOR Magazine to share this information and to let us know where they will be doing their next training session.
PCM only goes where they are invited so if you’re interested give them a call, they will come to schools, churches, community events and etc.
Itinerary/Upcoming Events
For upcoming events visit their website
Contact information:
People’s Community Medics
Email Address peoples communitymedics@gmail.com
Telephone number (510) 239-7720
Website www.peoplescommunitymedics.org