website—is far more diverse. If a basic fact like executive composition wasn’t updated, what else did this reporting fail to revisit? Investigative journalism demands rigor, context, and fairness. This report offers none of the above. Instead, it revives a frozen, pandemic-era version of our hospital and presents it as present-day truth. Albany’s lived reality—and Phoebe’s current operations—deserve better than that. Who Is Helped by This Article? Certainly Not Albany. Let’s be clear: the article does not support our community. It undermines recruitment at a time when rural hospitals are already struggling to hire nurses and physicians. It fuels outdated narratives about dysfunction in majority-Black Southern communities. It may dampen philanthropic support for uninsured patients. And it distracts from the real structural barriers that shape health outcomes in Albany and cities like ours. Criticism is fair game. But criticism must be current, accurate, and contextualized. This story is none of those things. The Real Crises Deserving National Attention If ProPublica wanted to shed light on health injustice in America, Albany could absolutely be part of that narrative—but not as a political detour. The real headlines today are about: • States refusing Medicaid expansion • Rural hospitals on the brink of closure • A national shortage of health-care workers • Growing attacks on the ACA • Weakening of science-based leadership at the federal level • Structural racism driving chronic illness in majority-Black communities These forces—not the outdated anecdotes highlighted in ProPublica’s piece—pose the greatest threat to Albany’s long-term health. Albany Is More Than the Story They Chose to Tell
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