SMHA’S President, Lorna Bourg, an advisor to the Hopkins Street Economic Development District in the West End of New Iberia, congratulates the Board of Commissioners for voting to approve their determination to proceed with the creation of a medical clinic on the property donated by Bill Dore. The vote was taken at the Commissioners’ meeting in New Iberia on Monday, December 16, 2024.
In 1971, through much opposition, SMHA was successful in creating the Teche Action Clinic, the first medical and dental clinic for sugar-cane farmworker families in St. Mary Parish. In the first year there were ten thousand visits of local rural patients. The clinic became a model for what is now a system of over 50 clinics across the state of Louisiana, which operate independently of SMHA. These clinics are still here even as the historic charity hospitals no longer exist.
With the help of Tulane Medical Students and public health physicians, Sister Anne Bizalion and Lorna conducted a Plantation Health Survey to document the urgent need of the sugar cane workers having local access to health care.
