Every Individual in the World Is Our Patient

We cannot heal every wound on this planet. But when we have the ability to save the life of a child, we should never let ideology stand in the way.

I will never forget about a child I cared for in the ER several years ago. They were pale and lethargic, their eyes sunken in. Their mother carried them through the sliding doors, frantic. They had been sick for days, worsening by the hour. By the time we started an IV, placed them on oxygen, and drew blood, I could see from the monitors that they were in trouble. Our team rushed to stabilize them, and then we called the pediatric specialists who could give them what they truly needed: care beyond what our community hospital could provide.

They survived because we never stopped and asked the questions some politicians seem to think should come first before care: Where were they born? Do they “belong” here? Can we afford to take care of them? In that moment, all that mattered was that this was a child in front of us, and we had the ability—and the responsibility—to help.

That is the ethos of medicine: every human being who crosses our threshold is our patient who deserves our help and care. That’s why last week’s announcement from the U.S. State Department is so alarming.

That is the ethos of medicine: every human being who crosses our threshold is our patient who deserves our help and care.

The Trump Administration froze humanitarian visas for people from Gaza, including children who had already been scheduled to come to this country for treatment. These are kids with congenital heart defects, burn injuries, cancers—conditions for which Gaza’s shattered health system has no capacity to help. For their parents, these visas represented not politics, but hope and survival. Now, that hope was suddenly, summarily revoked.

Why the sudden change? Politics. Laura Loomer, the far-right provocateur who has somehow found her way into the inner circle of this administration, put pressure on Trump to stop these visas. Loomer posted videos of injured Palestinian children arriving in the United States, describing them as “Islamic invaders” and declaring, “We are not the world’s hospital.” Within days, the State Department halted the visa program. Loomer even bragged publicly that she had convinced Secretary of State Marco Rubio to act.

Rubio, who in this administration also somehow wears the hats of National Security Advisor, USAID administrator, and even National Archivist, defended the freeze on live television. He claimed that some aid groups might have “links” to Hamas, though he offered no evidence. What was left unsaid is that this policy shift wasn’t about evidence—it was about politics. And children are the collateral damage.

Loomer’s phrase—“We are not the world’s hospital”—is one that demands a response from physicians and health care advocates. I know she meant it as a dismissal, a declaration that America has no obligation to care for anyone beyond its borders.

Loomer’s phrase—“We are not the world’s hospital”—is one that demands a response from physicians and health care advocates.

But doctors know the truth runs in the opposite direction. To us, every individual in the world is our patient. If a person is bleeding on the street in front of us, we do not stop to ask where they come from before we reach for gloves and gauze. That is not political correctness; it is the moral core of medicine.

Yet here we are. The State Department is effectively telling gravely ill children: “Your suffering is too politically complicated for us to address.” Aid organizations like HEAL Palestine and the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund are reeling. They have spent years coordinating temporary medical trips so that kids could get lifesaving treatment in American hospitals. Now those trips are canceled, not because of logistics or funding, but because one conspiracy theorist with a platform stoked fear and resentment online.

I keep thinking back to that child in my ER. What if we had hesitated? What if we had decided that helping them was too costly, or too politically fraught? They might not be alive today. That is the line we cross when we reduce medical care to a political football.

Rubio wants us to believe that this freeze is a matter of national security. But what is secure about abandoning children to die from not getting the chemotherapy or surgery they need to live? What does it say about our nation when compassion is rebranded as weakness, and fear is allowed to dictate policy?

The World Health Organization has pleaded for more medical evacuations from Gaza, warning of catastrophic consequences if children cannot leave. Doctors know those consequences intimately. We see them every day in the hospital, in the faces of children gasping for air, mothers and fathers clutching their hands, families praying for one more chance.

Loomer is right in one sense: America is not the world’s hospital. But we should aspire to something far greater than the cramped moral vision she offers. We cannot heal every wound on this planet. But when we have the ability to save the life of a child, we should never let ideology stand in the way.

We cannot heal every wound on this planet. But when we have the ability to save the life of a child, we should never let ideology stand in the way.

As physicians, we will keep insisting that every life is worth saving. It is time for our leaders to catch up.