单项选择题

Rich or poor, American Indians in Cities across the country are facing startling health challenges unlike those of any other urban population, according to a new study of federal data.
Even as urban American Indians move up the income ladder, researchers found rates of binge drinking and tobacco use in the community are staying the same—or sometimes even increasing— in cities from New York to Helena, Mont. "When Indian folks drink, it appears to have nothing to do with how much money they have, and that’s not true for any other racial group," said Maile Taualii, scientific director at the Seattle-based Urban Indian Health Institute, which announced the findings March 5. " There seems to be a sense of hopelessness, a sense that diabetes, alcoholism and other health problems are inevitable in the community. "
More than half of all American Indians and Alaska Natives in the Untied States live in cities. And for years—decades in some places—Native people have been receiving health care at government-funded tribal clinics in or near the urban areas where they live. Yet rarely have medical studies focused on the population’s health as compared to other city dwellers, or to illness rates among Indian people living on tribal lands.
Analysts were alarmed by what they found: Among Indian respondents who reported drinking, rates of binge drinking sometimes grew higher as respondents’ income increased, instead of declining as with all other races, Taualii said. Researchers also concluded that rates of diabetes, obesity and smoking remained about the same among low-income and wealthy urban Indians. That’s not the case in the general population, where people with lower incomes tend to experience higher rates of those health problems, Taualii said. Those results—and data showing that Native people in some cities reported having more difficulty getting health care than urbanites of other backgrounds—show special attention must be paid to the health disparities for urban Indians, Tualii said.
For the third year in a row, President Bush’s 2009 budget proposal calls for the Urban Indian Health Program’s funding to be cut. Newman Washington, who runs drug and alcohol program at a government-funded Indian clinic in Wichita, Kan. , said tight finances already made it difficult to meet the needs of patients from the Kickapoo, Potawatomi and other nearby tribes, Clients trying to detox from alcohol often have to wait two months to be admitted to a hospital bed, or travel 75 miles to Ponca City, Okla. , to be seen in an impatient facility, Washington said. "People go away and get an education, but then they come back home and have a really hard time changing their behavior," said Washington, a member of the Eastern Shoshone Tribe of Wyoming. "Whenever you start looking at the core, there’s some shame and guilt that people are carrying around from past generations. "
Clinics like Washington’s are one of the few places urban American Indians can seek out culturally competent health care. Providing health care to all Indians has long been part of the government’s trust responsibility, but several in the government’s network came under fire last year for mismanagement.
A bill approved by the Senate the week of Feb. 25 would boost programs a the federally funded HIS, prompt new construction and modernization of health clinics on reservations and attempt to recruit more Indians into health professions.
According to the passage, which of the following statements is CORRECT