Fifty Five Arrested
ADAPT Stands Firm at the AMA
ADAPT Action Report: Monday, September 10, 2007.By Tim Wheat
ADAPT, the nation’s largest direct-action disability rights organization was in Chicago fifteen years ago to confront the American Medical Association about physicians practice of steering people with disabilities into institutions. Today ADAPT was back with the same message and shut-down the massive complex of the AMA for over three hours until the police isolated the north door of the building and arrested 55 activists.
ADAPT attempted to push past phony construction barriers on the north side and get into the building, but the large complex was locked-down as the AMA expected they may be a target of ADAPT. Following a short unsuccessful attempt to get into the building, the whole of ADAPT wrapped around the compound and the group blocked the doors and stopped business at the AMA. Around 35 ADAPT activists split off from the main assembly and blocked the underground parking structure.
“Fifteen years ago we had the same issue,” said Mike Oxford of Kansas ADAPT who remembers the Chicago ADAPT action in 1992. “The AMA has gotten better with their language, but they still have doctors with financial interests in the facilities they are referring people; and that has to stop.”
ADAPT demanded that the AMA endorse the Community Choice Act, work with ADAPT to get real options for people facing institutionalization, have the AMA board of Trustees divest from nursing facilities and to develop an AMA ethics policy requiring doctors to disclose if they are invested in a long-term care facility.
The police and Mayor’s office worked to negotiate with the AMA, while ADAPT activists chanted and sang to keep up their energy. Many ADAPT members wrote colorful messages to the AMA in chalk on the sidewalk and in temporary paint on the glass windows. The group unfurled two large banners one over 50 feet long that said “STOP FUNDING INSTITUTIONS.”