{"id":26003,"date":"2026-05-22T08:32:24","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T12:32:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/?p=26003"},"modified":"2026-05-22T08:32:25","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T12:32:25","slug":"trumps-50b-rural-health-bet-meets-a-healthcare-desert-in-north-carolina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/?p=26003","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s $50B Rural Health Bet Meets a Healthcare Desert in North Carolina"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

(By Sarah Jane Tribble and Amanda Seitz for KFF Health News)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

WILLIAMSTON, N.C. \u2014 Two years after her brother\u2019s death, Debra Pierce still wonders whether the 50-year-old would have survived his heart attack if her local hospital hadn\u2019t closed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe sad thing is we\u2019ll never know if he could have been saved that night or not, because we don\u2019t have a higher level of care in this county,\u201d Pierce said as she stood outside the mobile home where she last hugged her brother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Emergency crews from a neighboring town worked on Stanley Sears for a half hour but couldn\u2019t revive him for the long drive to the closest hospital, records show. Continue reading here…<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kaiser Health News is a nonprofit national health polity news service that is part of the nonpartisan Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Notice:<\/strong>\u00a0The link provided above connects readers to the full content of the posted article. The URL (internet address) for this link is valid on the posted date; medicarereport.org cannot guarantee the duration of the link\u2019s validity. Also, the opinions expressed in these postings are the viewpoints of the original source and are not explicitly endorsed by AMAC, Inc.; the AMAC Foundation, Inc.; or medicarereport.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(By Sarah Jane Tribble and Amanda Seitz for KFF Health News) WILLIAMSTON, N.C. \u2014 Two years after her brother\u2019s death,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,21,10,587],"tags":[385,2077,238,410],"class_list":["post-26003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-emerging-health-issues","category-health-care-finance","category-legislative-update","category-rural-health","tag-healthcare-costs","tag-healthcare-desert","tag-healthcare-finance","tag-rural-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=26003"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26003\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26004,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26003\/revisions\/26004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=26003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=26003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=26003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}