I have never involved myself in politics before. Certainly never American politics as I am Canadian. Born, raised and will die a proud Canadian. However what happens in America affects the whole free world. Deny this if you want to but it is done at the peril of all the freedoms we enjoy.
Peace on earth and good will towards men is a Christian concept and I am not a Christian. I am an atheist. I am a fiscal conservative who supports gay marriage, pro choice, live and let live kind of guy who wishes we could all get along. But at my age it is a dream that I see in the play of my grandchildren. Because of all the evil that exists in the world today it is not a reality. I fear it will never be one.
The letter I posted below was sent by my wife and I to all the newspapers we could find in America during your last election. Had to get the truth out about what is and is not real regarding our personal experience with Canadian Health Care. It is not a system any country should use as an example of what to copy but rather an example of what NOT to do.
We were concerned about what we heard Obama say regarding this issue. He was saying it was a good idea to bring our Canadian health care system into America. It made me wonder what turnip truck he fell off of because it is the system I live and it is not a good one.
This is my story ....
I am a proud Canadian. I would die for my country and I have always had the greatest of respect for my neighbour. Canada and America have lived side by side in peace for almost 200 years. The last fight we had was in 1812 when we burned down the White House. Sorry about that eh? No worries about that anymore because they took away our guns a long time ago. Not that I am a fan of them but .....
Our systems are governing are very different. We use the Parliamentary system here which means we get dictated to all the time. We let our Liberal (Dem) government bring a framework into our country in the late 1960's that gave us "free" heath care, social service programs that are extremely generous (we pay immigrants more money to come here than we do to support our senior citizens), turned our government into one of our biggest employers, the list is endless .... it is the framework they have slowly been introducing into America for quite a long time now.
It turned so ugly that our parties fractured and new parties grew out of that making it impossible for us to get a majority government elected so we can start turning things around. All they can do is keep raising taxes to try and hold up a collapsing system. Pay attention to the word 'FRAMEWORK' - I am hearing it a lot from your side of the border my friends and it is a dangerous word.
It is full of hand outs, creates a dependancy on the government that is dangerous for a free society and one day you wake up and realize Grandma was right - FREE IS NEVER FREE!
The rich get richer, the poor get richer and the middle class is slowly squeezed to death because we are the majority population so we are the ones who 'give' the most. The worker bees who are the easiest to tax because there is no one else to turn to. When they cannot tax us outright, they do it in hidden taxes and most Canadians have no real idea how much tax they really give to the Government because it floats away in bits and pieces.
I am told that our personal income tax level is about twenty-two percent. But that is a joke. That is what our government takes off the top. You know at tax time when all honest hard working people own up or Johnny Law comes a callin'! unless you are part of the underground society (yes, we have one here as well) though most people believe Canada is a refrigerator so not as many. That misconception about my country is both a blessing and a curse.
We are the second largest land mass country in the world. Every once in a while when Russia has a seizure we move to number one but then they pull their tanks out and move into the lead again. Our population is about 32 million people and it is not big enough to support our social programs so we go out in the world and 'purchase' new Canadians. Support them to move here. May sound like a plan but we can't pay for what we have now.
Abuse of our system is rampant and hard to control. They have found as many as ten "Canadians" using one "free" medical card (which we call a Care Card). I hear you told all the time about how preventitive medicine will be good for your country. How your medicare and medicade is already a form of 'socialized' care so how is expanding it going to hurt? REALLY!
They must think you all fell off the same turnip truck we did back in the late 1960's? They want you to believe that those who cannot even get a damn letter from door A to door B correctly can run your whole social system?
My mother, my aunt and I ....
The first clue I had that there was a problem in our system was about five years ago when our family doctor retired and we could not find another one. Clinics had been springing up all over the place but we never took notice of them because we had our own, personal doctor. Had been with him for about 15 years. We had to start going to a clinic where they did not take appointments because of a severe shortage of doctors right across Canada.
At the clinicc, you have to be there at the time the doctor started his shift and were then told what time to come back or you could wait. Hours ... sometimes we returned to our alloted time to find out he had left. Our government has a strict limit on the number of people a Doc can see in a day. At times, we have to start all over again the next day and never knew who we were going to see. I retired a couple of years ago so though it is a pain in the arse it does not matter I guess .... our time is worth nothing to the government. All they want are taxes ....
When my 83 year old mother became ill in early 2009. She was in fairly good health but had picked up a virus - ended up for a few days in the hospital.
Not really a place I hung out at much. At my age you never know when your numbers up, your ticker stops, your drum has drummed its last beat - so I try to avoid those places. Every day above ground is a good day right!
Our government had privatized the cleaning staff which were top notch a few years ago to try and save money so a private company had taken it over. The difference was huge and not good! I was surprised at how dirty the place was!
Low wages are not an incentive for workers to take pride in their job. The nursing staff were excellent but were obviously overwhelmed. No slow motion out of any of the gals. Doctors were good but my mom saw a different person every day. Family docs are no longer allowed visits to the hosp even if you are lucky enough to still have one. Complete strangers take care of you. At least in the day your Doc came to see you there there was some comfort in the familiarity of that visit. Does not happen here anymore.
Anyway they send my mom home and four days later we rush her back with a raging infection. My mother almost died. It was days until they told us she had got an infection in her blood and probably got it when she was in hospital the first time. Their fault? It was a bad infection and when I took a look on the net I found stories of hospitals right across Canada having the same problem.
My mother did have one problem she was born with. She only has one kidney. Well all the antibiotics they gave her to cure the infection she got from them has pretty well destoryed that kidney. As she fought her way back to health we were told that she would probably need dialysis within the year. Problem is there is a list - and because of her age she would not be a priority patient. In the end she may die before her name comes up. We could however pay cash and that will put her right at the front of the list. As a family we will do this when the time comes if she has not been called. She is my mother and her life has meaning to my family. The whole ordeal weakened her but she has fought back like a trooper. She is my mother and we will take care of her. Maybe she has no worth in our health care system but she has great value to my family and I and there is nothing we will not do to keep her with us.
So that was the first kick in the pants .... the second is I got cancer. I am in my 60's, fairly active, trim (okay skinny!) - waterski every summer and love to curl in the winter. Not my hair by the way (lost most of that a long time ago) but with a rock and a broom on real ice. So I saw a specialist. Biggest count against me is that I have been a smoker all my life. They did a test to confirm I had cancer and then determined they will watch what it does.
I thought to myself 'wait a minute! I have cancer and all your gonna do is watch it?' Yep, I am being watched. I do not know what they figure its going to do I mean in my mind if you have cancer it usually gets worse right? Don't have to be a doctor to figure that out and if I was given a choice I want it out! It has taken months but with some arm twisting by some doctor friends of my wife I am seeing someone else for a second opinion. She was ready to pack me up and take me to the states. It was nice I had value to my wife and kids but kind of disappointing that my government placed no value on me.
I was a hard working man all my life. Thirty odd years working a blue collar job. Paid my taxes, raised my beautiful family just like my parents did. But now we are being given selective care. Not a very nice feeling.
My wife had a favorite Aunt who got very ill. Every test they did showed nothing. She would not eat. They asked her to but she just would not eat. Very depressed. But in her 80's again so she shipped her into the hospice ward and let her die. All she needed was help but at her age I guess she was just not worth helping. She was worth something to me and my family and the government as long as she paid taxes for care she never got at the end of her life. It was easier just to let her die. I know all about selective care because I am part of the system. Is that what they are going to do to me I wonder?
My wife ....
I always thought things happened in threes and then you were done with bad luck. But I guess God decided I needed one more example.
My wife became very ill on Christmas night and I had to rush her to emergency. They were over run there as usual but things seemed to be moving along. I think I took her there about ten o'clock. I sat with her and I am glad I did. See my government had a great idea. They are so short of staff that they hired students to work the Christmas holidays. Sixteen months was all they need to be designated as 'Grad' Nurses even though they were in a four year nursing program. None of them were even half way through it.
About four in the morning I called a Registered Nurse over and told her something was wrong with my wife. Her breathing was really slow. I never saw people move so fast in all my life. FYI apparently breathing only 8 times in a minute means you could die - soon. I found out later that one RN had four patients to care for and four students working under her. But those students were also responsible for four patients meaning the RN was actually in charge of 20 people. Very sick people.
Had the staff not moved in to take care of my wife she would be dead right now. One of the students had given her a huge overdose of morphine. If I had not been there with her - she would probably be dead because they were run off their feet as always.
When I hear Obama say you needed a health care system like ours I had to get the word out. I am a proud Canadian but we have made huge mistakes here over the years and this health care system is one of them. It is falling in on itself and people are dying in the hallways because of it. If you are like me who never needed it until now - then you don't know. By the time you find out its too late.
I have heard Americans thinking we get lots of free stuff and the answer is we pay for our meds ourself, we pay to get our eyes checked, buy glasses, chiro, massage, physio all come out of pocket here in BC. Dentist treatment - we pay so what do we really get that is free? I could tell your more but I will only make a difference to those of you who want to hear what I am saying and believe what I am saying. You may get good stories (and Michael Moore DID NOT tell you the truth - he told you the truth he wanted you to hear).
My wife and I have family right across Canada and in some cases it is a little better though the doctors shortage is bad right across the country. By the way our coverage used to be good Province to Province but now anymore. You get tested or treated for anything immediately if you pay cash. I know a lot of Canadians who are so pissed off they take their money to America where the hospitals are clean.
You need health care reform America but you must get it right. To get this wrong will destroy your country. You have buffoons in government trying to take control of the largest part of your economy. They can't even run the post office and you want to turn health care over to them?
Change your system but do it right. Make them take the time to search out what works and what does not work. What will help every American and what will not. Demand they get it right.
Any questions?
Just ask.
By Drew Zahn
© 2010 WorldNetDaily
Isaiah May
Isaiah James May was born a little after 5 p.m. on Oct. 24, 2009, and was scheduled to die this past week – on Wednesday, Jan. 20 – just short of his three-month birthday.
That was the day chosen by Canada's publicly funded, government health service as the deadline for Isaiah to recover from his traumatic birth or be taken off life-support.
"There is no hope of recovery for Isaiah," reads a letter from Alberta Health Services delivered to Isaiah's parents and dated one week before the health care system intended to pull the plug on the baby it has determined irreparably brain damaged.
"Your treating physicians regretfully have come to the conclusion that withdrawal of active treatment is medically reasonable, ethically responsible and appropriate," the letter states. "We must put the interests of your son foremost, and it is in his best interests to discontinue mechanical ventilation support."
Parents Isaac and Rebecka May, however, immediately appealed to the courts for more time, encouraged by signs that their boy was growing and moving, pointing to instance after instance where Isaiah had already proven the doctors wrong.
"He is doing everything they said that he would not do. Every day he does something new. So that helps us to fight," the baby's 23-year-old mother told CBC News. "His eyes dilate. He opens his eyes. He moves his limbs. He's growing. He's gaining weight. He's living. They told us he would never do any of that."
Then, the day before the hospital planned to allow Isaiah to die, a judge granted Isaiah a few more days of life.
Court of Queen's Bench Justice Michelle Crighton gave Isaiah's parents one week, until Jan. 27, to find an independent expert – to determine if or when the baby should be taken off life-support
Isaiah was born after a difficult 40 hours of labor, but the umbilical cord had wrapped itself around the baby's neck and deprived the newborn of oxygen. Isaiah was immediately taken by air ambulance to Stollery Children's Hospital in Edmonton, where he has survived with the help of a ventilator and feedings through an IV tube.
But through his three months of care, his doctors believe Isaiah has suffered irreversible brain damage and have offered his young parents no hope for the boy's recovery.
After Isaac and Rebecka May received the letter informing them life-support would be terminated on their son, they turned to the courts, seeking a 90-day window for continued observation of the progress they believe their son is making in spite of the doctor's predictions.
According to court documents reported by the Calgary Herald, the baby's mother claims doctors said Isaiah wouldn't live past three days, wouldn't grow, wouldn't be able to urinate or move. May says the doctors told her brain death would cause Isaiah's head to shrink and his brain to turn to "mush."
Instead, she says, not only has Isaiah's head grown, but he has also gained more than three pounds, wets his diaper, moves his hands, feet and arms and opens his eyes every day, according to court documents.
"It's pretty cool seeing little changes every day," his 22-year-old father told the Herald. "Of course, it's not easy, being there watching him on the bed like that, but we're just doing everything we can right now to know we've done everything we can do."
The couple's attorney told Edmonton's CTV News, "The family has asked for 90 days in order to see how the child will develop, if the child will grow, if there's any improvement in the child's condition."
Brent Windwick, the lawyer representing Alberta Health Services and the Stollery Children's Hospital, has asked the court to allow no more than 30 days before making its decision.
Alberta Health Services, in turn, released a statement: "The medical and ethical discussions for this family and care providers are the most difficult imaginable. Our heartfelt sympathies go out to the family. Our medical, nursing and allied health teams have and will continue to support this family in every way possible. It is appropriate to turn now to the courts for direction."
The court, however, granted the family only seven days to find an independent expert to evaluate their son and determine a future course of action.
Reported friends of the family have established a Facebook page for prayers and support for the May family. The page includes photos and videos of Isaiah, telephone numbers for complaints registered to Alberta Health Services, a mailing address for the Mays, who are currently staying at an Edmonton Ronald McDonald House, and links for financial donations through PayPal.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=122934
No comments:
Post a Comment
Something on your mind? Leave a comment ....