Surgeon general pick 'would do anything to heal'

— -- President Obama on Monday nominated for surgeon general an influential rural family physician who has spent the past two decades caring for a shrimping community along the Gulf Coast.

Obama said Regina Benjamin understands the needs of the poor and uninsured and is a tireless promoter of wellness programs, making her qualified to be America's advocate during health care reforms.

Benjamin founded her non-profit clinic in 1990 for a diverse community of 2,500 near her home in Bayou La Batre, Ala., and had to rebuild it three times. It was destroyed twice by hurricanes and once by fire. After Hurricane Katrina in 2005, Obama said, she mortgaged her own house for the reconstruction and told the pharmacy to send her patients' bills to her when they couldn't afford their medicine.

"And for all that she's seen and overcome, she represents what's best about health care: doctors and nurses who give and care and sacrifice for the sake of their patients, those Americans who would do anything to heal a fellow citizen," Obama said. "When people couldn't pay, she didn't charge them. When the clinic wasn't making money, she didn't take a salary for herself."

Benjamin, 51, became the first African-American woman to be named to the American Medical Association's board of trustees in 1995 and last year received one of the MacArthur Foundation's $500,000 "genius grants." After graduating from the University of Alabama School of Medicine in 1984, she worked in Alabama as part of her obligation to the National Health Service Corps, a Department of Health and Human Services program that places physicians in underserved communities in exchange for tuition reimbursement.

Public health also has become "very personal" to her.

"My father died of diabetes and hypertension. My older brother and only sibling died at age 44 of HIV-related illness. My mother died of lung cancer because as a young girl, she wanted to smoke, just like her twin brother. My uncle Buddy, my mother's twin, is at home right now on oxygen struggling for each breath because of the years of smoking."

Those preventable diseases, she said, were why her family wasn't present with her at the nomination announcement: "While I cannot change my family's past, I can be a voice in the movement to improve our nation's health care and a nation's health for the future."

She thanked Obama for making health care reform a top priority, adding that "Millions of Americans can't afford insurance and don't have basic health services available where they live."

She also thanked former surgeon general David Satcher and former Department of Health and Human Services secretary Louis Sullivan for mentoring her and leading her to start her clinic, which she helped pay for by moonlighting in emergency rooms.

"I am really impressed with how she's dealt with the underserved and how she's dealt with tragedy," said Satcher, one of her Morehouse teachers. "Her outstanding contributions have been recognized at the highest level."

Her nomination requires Senate confirmation. Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyoming), the ranking member on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pension, said he's looking forward to "carefully" reviewing her nomination.

Enzi said: "I'd like to know how Dr. Benjamin, if confirmed, would work with Congress to promote prevention and wellness initiatives that will bring down costs and help people lead healthier lives."