Where Are the Politicians’ Heads and Hearts?

With the state government swimming in red ink, it’s probably a bad time to discuss new spending. But it’s a perfect time to discuss our elected officials’ spending priorities.

Two state lawmakers have introduced bills to challenge today’s leading killer of Americans by requiring a defibrillator — the device used to shock a person’s heart back into rhythm after cardiac arrest — in every state building, senior center and senior care facility.

The Assembly members, Democrat Fran Pavley and Republican Shirley Horton, cite studies showing that when a person has a heart attack away from a hospital, defibrillation is crucial. As the president of the American Heart Association said in 2001, defibrillation is “the only effective treatment for most sudden cardiac arrests.”

Studies also show that without any training whatsoever, the average Joe can use an automatic external defibrillator — or AED, as it’s known in the medical world — to save a person’s life.

The math is simple. Putting the portable, lightweight AEDs in places where the highest percentage of potential heart attack victims congregate will save many lives.

The federal government already has taken steps to increase the availability of AEDs. Efforts started during President Clinton’s term and continued by the Bush administration ensure that AEDs will be available on airplanes and in all buildings leased or owned by the federal government. That includes post offices, Social Security offices, national parks and military bases.

State lawmakers have been debating public access to defibrillators since 1997, but California’s actions haven’t kept pace with the federal government’s — partly because of money problems and partly because of partisan politics.

The 1997 legislation, which sought to provide immunity from lawsuits for good Samaritans who use AEDs to try to save lives, was introduced by a Republican. It was opposed by Democrats and the Consumer Attorneys of California — the trial lawyers’ group which makes a great deal of money on lawsuits and which contributes heavily to the Democratic Party.

Not long after the failed Republican attempt, the Democrats had a change of heart when one of their own introduced a similar immunity bill. That measure passed with unanimous bipartisan support.

With this immunity in place, lawmakers have been trying to take the next step: promoting the installation of AEDs in government buildings and facilities for seniors. Several measures have stalled in the Legislature, and the two latest efforts haven’t gone anywhere, probably because there isn’t enough money for these devices that cost about $2,850 apiece.

Or is there?

Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson, D-Los Angeles, was recently discovered to have issued $350,000 worth of “consulting contracts” to six friends and former colleagues. These unnecessary contracts, which Wesson canceled after they became public, ate up enough money to put defibrillators in 123 senior centers.

The state also is contracted to spend $1 million per year to keep a single sexually violent predator under constant supervision once he is released from confinement in a state hospital. That’s the equivalent of 351 defibrillators.

Meanwhile, the California Association of Health Facilities, which represents about 1,400 nursing homes, gave $176,528 to politicians from both parties in 2001 — enough to buy 62 defibrillators for nursing homes. In 2002, the group gave $16,000 to the state Republican Party and $6,000 to the Democratic Party — an ideological puzzlement that would have been better used for another seven life-saving machines.

And then there is the growing sum that is being lost to interest payments because the Legislature and governor are dallying in responding to the state’s budget problems. Every day that goes by, more money is going down the toilet instead of being used by taxpayers or the government to help keep people alive.

It’s only going to get worse. Stay near a hospital when reading the daily news, because the utter stupidity of our elected officials is enough to knock your heart out of sync.

David Kline is a Sacramento native who has been writing about seniors' issues since 1991. He has served as Spectrum's editor for the past five years — a period that has seen the paper receive awards from the California Newspapers Publishers' Association and National Mature Media Awards program.