Supporters demand anti-viral treatment for Mumia Abu-Jamal
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SOCIALIST ACTION SEPTEMBER 2016 3 PHILADELPHIA—On Sept. 7, supporters of Mumia’s defense rallied outside Pennsylvania Governor Wolf’s office here to demand that the state act immediately to administer the necessary life-saving medication to Mumia Abu-Jamal and all other prisoners with hepa titis C.
On Aug. 31, a federal court turned down Mu mia’s suit to obtain the anti-viral drug based on a technicality—the suit was filed against the wrong state agency. The “proper” agency, Pennsylvania’s hepatitis C committee for pris oner treatment, didn’t even exist at the time of filing over one year ago.
Pam Africa of the International Friends and Family of Mumia Abu-Jamal stated, “What we see here is another attempt to kill Mumia, an innocent man, by other means. We are also demanding his immediate release.”
On the positive side, U.S. District Court Judge Robert Mariani also declared that Pennsylva nia’s protocol for treatment of its prisoners for hepatitis C is unconstitutional (prisoners must be diagnosed to be nearly at immedi ate risk of death before receiving the proper medicines), and that it could prolong the suf fering of the state’s nearly 6000 prisoners with Hep-C.
The medication that Mumia has been trying to obtain has about a 95% cure rate, but is ex orbitantly expensive in the United States.
“We won everything but the injunction we sought, and will be moving expeditiously to bring additional defendants before the court so Mr. Abu-Jamal can receive the treatment he is entitled to under the U.S. Constitution,” said Bret Grote of the Abolitionist Law Center, which is handling the legal aspects of Mumia’s medical case.
Mumia contracted the disease from a blood transfusion after he was shot by a police offi cer in the 1981 event for which he was framed up and given the death penalty. The hepatitis has caused him extreme suffering—including diabetic shock, anemia, rapid weight loss, and an itchy skin condition. Left untreated, hepa titis C can be fatal. n freedom now!
Mumia’s case embodies the police terror and shoot ings on the streets, the false and frame-up prosecu tions in the courts, the dehumanization and ware housing of mass incarceration, and the ultimate act of “legal” lynching in the racist death penalty. n for his stance and Tommie Smith and John Carlos’s raised fists caused pub lic ostracization and numerous death threats, we still need to call attention to the same racial inequities. Failure to fix this problem is what’s really un-Ameri can here.” n