the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
May 18, 2026
Remote Area Medical (RAM) is a non-profit organization that provides medical care to anyone who needs it—for free. No insurance needed, not even an ID. No questions asked. RAM sets up about 90 clinics a year, typically for two or three days each, across the U.S.
There is only one problem: so many people come to RAM’s “pop-up” clinics that many can’t get the care they need. A recent segment of the CBS program 60 Minutes shows hundreds of people lining up outside a three-day RAM clinic in Knoxville, Tennessee, days before it opens. The patients have driven hundreds of miles. They sleep in their cars at subfreezing temperatures, for three nights or more, until the clinic opens.
About half of the patients have no insurance. Others have insurance they can’t use because of high co-pays and deductibles. The vast majority are there for eye or dental care—services insurance plans usually don’t even cover.
About 1,200 people are there for dental; and some of their stories are heart-wrenching. There is the construction worker who lost his teeth to a work accident and companies refuse to hire him, saying he must be a meth addict. There is a young man who insists that the dentist pull all of his teeth, even though some can be saved, because he has no access to dental care otherwise. RAM technicians provide dentures to 24 patients just over that one weekend.
The vast majority of RAM staff are volunteers—nearly 900 of them that weekend in Knoxville, coming from all over the U.S. The money needed for the paid staff and supplies comes from donations. The clinics are set up where available—in libraries, warehouses, even animal stalls.
RAM started out 40 years ago, to fly health care workers and supplies to remote, isolated villages in the Amazon rainforest. Soon, it extended its services to that other health care desert called the USA. Today, 90% of RAM’s work is in cities and towns across the U.S.
A recent Gallup poll found that one in every three Americans cuts back on food, gasoline or electricity, or borrows money, to pay health care bills. Some forgo health care altogether. And it’s expected to get worse. Cuts to Medicaid have already caused an estimated three million people to lose health insurance, with millions of others certain to follow in coming years.
And on top of that, the federal government has ended subsidies for individuals buying health insurance, while insurance companies have doubled premiums.
RAM’s mobile clinics show none of that is necessary; that affordable health care is possible for all of us. And RAM volunteers show that the problem is not the people. Health care workers at all levels do their job, and will go above and beyond it, to meet their patients’ needs. The problem is the health care industry’s relentless profit drive.