…because good journalism entails understanding more than just the neighborhood you grew up in.

Amen.

In a story revealing that Canadian physicians are setting aside doses of the antiviral drug Tamiflu for family and friends in the event that forecasts of a bird flu pandemic are borne out, the CBC lists the reasons against “stockpiling”:

Infectious disease specialist Dr. Allison McGeer of Toronto’s Mount Sinai said she understands why some of her colleagues are acquiring a personal stockpile of Tamiflu. Ethically, though, she said the federal government should be protecting everyone.
“The best protection if we don’t have vaccine is one dose of prophylactic for every Canadian for every day for two waves of the pandemic,” McGeer said.
The idea of personal stockpiles of Tamiflu worries most public health officials like McGeer, and some are advising doctors against writing the prescriptions.
The reasons against stockpiling are:

The resistance hypothesis � Widespread use of Tamiflu among patients with influenza could lead to resistant strains of flu, potentially making the drug useless.

Shelf-life: Tamiflu is only guaranteed for five years, yet no one knows when a pandemic will hit.

Equity: At $5 per pill, not everyone will be able to afford a personal stockpile.

Emphasis mine.
We have just been reminded that simply having the financial resources to purchase your own medications is reason enough to be denied access to them.
This is what Trudeaupia has come to. We are rapidly moving past the “equity” of months long waiting lists and zero-tier Health Care Prohibition Zones into a hyper-socialist model where “universality” is defined as a government policy that applies as equally to health care denied as it does health care provided.
With a shelf life of 5 years, a family’s investment in Tamiflu works out to $1 a year per pill, per person. In the insanity that has become the Canadian health care system, this fact is actually cited as a reason not to allow Canadians to make it.
Without saying so in so many words, official government policy towards the pandemic we are all being warned is coming, is this: until every Canadian can afford to set aside a handful of $5 pills, death equity for Canadians will remain official Canadian Government policy.

Gateway Pundit;

With a program called “Drive out the Trash” you get a sense of how President Mugabe feels about certain Zimbabweans. And, when the government destroys their homes, destroys their means of earning a living, and destroys their food, in a country already threatened with famine,… only time separates these people from certain death.
The genocide has begun in Zimbabwe.

There’s video. Normblog has personal accounts that are sickening.
Of course, all of this suffering and poverty could be alleviated if only the industrialized countries would give more.

In keeping with my recent trend of ‘all gay, all the time’ here at SDA, I am pleased to present the following news item to you:

Police officers who arrested a student for calling a police horse “gay” have been accused of “absurd heavy-handedness and over-reaction” by a leading campaigner for homosexual rights.

Peter Tatchell of the pressure group Outrage! said that the arrest of Sam Brown, a student at Oxford University, “brought the police service into disrepute”.

Mr Brown, 21, a student at Balliol College, was arrested for causing harassment, alarm or distress and fined �80 after asking a mounted police officer if he knew that his horse was homosexual.

The student made the remark during a night out in Oxford where he was celebrating completing his English Literature degree.

Apparently the police refused to comment further on the matter and thus the Telegraph was unable to confirm that the arrest was prompted by the fact that Mr. Brown was ‘hung like a horse’.

Arthur Weinreb has a blistering editorial on the health care system of the Great White North in today’s Canada Free Press.
Supreme Court said what politicians won’t say

[…] In the decision of Chaoulli v. Quebec (Attorney General) that was handed down on Thursday by the Supreme Court of Canada, the court found that Quebec laws that prohibit the purchase of insurance to cover private medical treatment violated the Quebec Charter and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The majority of the court found that waiting times in the public system violated the Quebec Charter of Rights. While it was not necessary to decide, three of the justices found that the Quebec law violates section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights that guarantees the right to life, liberty and security of the person. The court held that delays in the public health system led to prolonged pain and suffering, deteriorating medical conditions and in some cases, death. In coming to this conclusion in what will inevitably be to the dismay of those on the political left, the Supreme Court followed its 1998 decision in R. v. Morgentaler that held that delays encountered by women seeking abortions breached section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The interesting aspect of the Chaoulli decision, and the one that most deviated from what politicians of all political parties have been spewing for years was the finding that this breach of a charter right was not reasonable. The court found that while the preservation of a publicly funded health care system was a substantive and legitimate government objective, the outright ban on private health care insurance had no rational connection to saving the public system and went further than was necessary to meet that objective. In the majority�s opinion, the government of Quebec failed to show that allowing Quebeckers to purchase insurance for private health care would destroy Canada�s public health care system. In reaching this conclusion the court examined other countries in the OECD such as Sweden and the U.K. that have strong public health care systems despite allowing private parallel health care services.
This finding is at odds with what the politicians have been saying for years; that not only will allowing private medical services destroy our health care system; it will destroy Canada as we know it. The entire fabric of our society will disappear. We are constantly being told that our health care system is what defines us as a country. Allow someone to actually pay for what is now a public service and we will be no different than the United States.
[…]
The Supreme Court of Canada was right � the public system as we know it will not end. But hopefully Chaoulli will mark the beginning of the end to all the political spin where the reality of the existence private medical care is denied. Perhaps it will also mark an end to this notion that it is better to allow people to suffer and die than it is to allow them to have access to private treatment.

Of course, allowing those with the means to escape the socialist system to do so creates inequality. There are a not insubstantial number of people who would indeed prefer that outcome.
crossposted to OTB

I’ve been following the various reactions to today’s Supreme Court decision. Mainly what I’m hearing is that ‘it’s the end of health care, yadda yadda yadda.’ Whatever. Everyone is missing the point as usual.

The point is that for the first time in my lifetime there is actually a reason for someone living in Canada to move to Quebec. I don’t think that’s been the case since, um… Since… Confederation.

Hehhh.

Canadian Court Chips Away at National Health Care (NYT RSS)

The Canadian Supreme Court struck down a Quebec law banning private medical insurance today, dealing an acute blow to the publicly financed national health care system. The court stopped short of striking down the constitutionality of the country’s vaunted nationwide coverage, but legal experts said the ruling would open the door to a wave of lawsuits challenging the health care system in other provinces.
The system, providing Canadians with free doctor’s services that are paid for by taxes, has generally been supported by the public, and is broadly identified with the Canadian national character. But in recent years, patients have been forced to wait longer for diagnostic tests and elective surgery, while the wealthy and well connected either seek care in the United States or use influence to jump ahead on waiting lists.
The court ruled that the waiting lists had become so long that they violated patients’ “liberty, safety and security” under the Quebec charter, which covers about one-quarter of Canada’s population. “The evidence in this case shows that delays in the public health care system are widespread and that in some serious cases, patients die as a result of waiting lists for public health care,” the Supreme Court ruled. “In sum, the prohibition on obtaining private health insurance is not constitutional where the public system fails to deliver reasonable services.”
The case was brought to the Supreme Court by a Montreal family doctor, Jacques Chaoulli, who argued his own case through the courts, and by a chemical salesman, George Zeliotis, who was forced to wait a year for a hip replacement while being prohibited from paying privately for surgery

Interesting. In the United States, many advocates of nationalized health care point to the Canadian model as an exemplar. Perhaps they should rethink that.
via OTB

Canada is on the hunt for name-callers:

Two thousand leaflets attacking gays and lesbians have put a Christian activist in western Canada under investigation by Edmonton police for hate crimes.

“Attacking”? Like with a stick?

The flyers by Bill Whatcott of Regina refer to gay marriage as “sodomite marriage” and use graphic language to describe the alleged sex practices of homosexuals.
The handouts also used derogatory terms to describe federal Defence Minister Bill Graham.

Oh, that sort of attacking. Like what children do. Calling people names. Being rude.
Children get their feelings hurt, and run to their parents. Adults are tougher than that, and ignore the offensive person, or dish it back out. They don’t run to their…
No wait — this is Canada. We do run to mommy government:

“The material is offensive and it’s an affront on the basic tenets of our society, which is about multiculturalism, tolerance and peaceful co-existence,” Const. Steve Camp, of the Edmonton police hate crimes unit, said.
Last month, the Saskatchewan Human Rights Tribunal fined [Bill Whatcott of Regina] $17,500 for handing out similar material.

They were “offensive” and “an affront”. Time to get the cops involved. Because an affront, which means “to insult intentionally, especially openly” must be pursued with the vigour and power of the state. It’s indicative of a bad thought that must be expunged for the good of all.
I better stop before someone comes after me for my doubleplusungood thoughts.
[Guest blogging for Kate: a slightly longer post is at Angry in the Great White North]

Continues to descend into the madness of Robert Mugabe.

CBC;

The owners of a restaurant and pub in Victoria by the Sea have been asked to pay the province $24,000 in anticipated sales tax before serving a single meal or pouring a pint.
[…]
Hunter and Storey have used their own money to set up shop on the Victoria wharf. And they have been able to avoid taking out a loan to help start their business.
Hunter can’t understand why government thinks he and his partner would run off with sales tax money.
The provincial government figures, based on projected sales, the PST for this summer will be $24,000. And it wants the money before any business takes place.
[…]
Provincial Tax Commissioner Jim Ramsey said taxpayers lose $2 million a year when businesses go under. He said new businesses that are considered high risk are asked to pay up front, and the policy is paying off.

Asking a small, self-financed business to fork over thousands before they open the doors, because they risk going under before their first tax bill comes due, sounds less like prudent departmental policy than it does self-fulfilling prophesy.
Via Stephen Taylor.

… was just on John Gormley Live a moment ago, stringing words together in virtually incoherent sentences.
(For example – he attempted to draw a link between the G7 and the Rwanda massacres, later bringing in BSE border closures.)
He was in the studio to promote his book The Collapse of Globalism.
Even though it’s radio, you can tell when Gormley opened his mouth – Saul’s cadence speeds up and his voice rises in an attempt to prevent interruption (and possible contradiction?). After a while, I stopped listening to what he was attempting to say, to concentrate on his word inflections.
(Question – how much public money has been invested in this twit’s writing career? I was tempted to call in and ask….)

CBC;

A Kelowna man who transported an unconscious man to hospital Wednesday morning couldn’t believe his ears when he was told to call 911 for help. Ralph Vogel had driven the victim to Kelowna General Hospital only to be greeted by staff that seemed unwilling to help.
Vogel says he ran into the hospital and told staff that there was a man either dying or dead in his motor home. When staff told him to call 911 and wait for an ambulance, he told them that the man was outside. He was still told to call 911.
The hospital now admits that staff made a mistake by refusing to treat the man in the parking lot. The victim was a homeless man that Vogel and his wife allowed to sleep in their motor home. But then they couldn’t wake him up.
By the time the ambulance arrived, it was too late. The man had already been dead for several hours.

It wasn’t the first time.
I know a woman who immigrated from Russia to Canada with her husband a few years ago. A dentist by profession (but unaccredited here) the medical background was probably somewhat helpful when she was forced to deliver her baby at home, unassisted, after a hospital in the “Birthplace Of Medicare” turned her away because she could not pay cash in advance.

The Greatest Canadian.
Kudos to London Fog for digging that up.

Janice MacKinnon tossed an electoral bomb into the lap of New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton on Wednesday, issuing a report calling on governments to introduce user-pay into the health care system through taxation of health benefits.

Ex-Sask. NDP finance minister proposes�user-pay tax�
A former New Democrat finance minister from Saskatchewan says Alberta should tax people for how often they use medical services.
Janice MacKinnon asks why would taxpayers want to continue to give millionaires free health care.
She says health care should be a taxable benefit based on use and income, as well as providing credit for healthy behaviour.
Alberta Health Minister Iris Evans says this is a very major change that MacKinnon is recommending that would have to be considered at a national level.� �

This is scary stuff.

Khemosabi! Khemosabi! Khemosabi!
That’s for you, Raskolnikov*.

Globe & Mail;

[T]omorrow night in the city of brotherly love, Mr. Chr�tien — accompanied by two RCMP officers decked out in their red serge dress uniforms — will receive an award as a global role model from a gay and lesbian activist group, the Equality Forum, for his support of same-sex marriage.
On Sunday, the two Mounties — one male, one female on assignment with the government-supported Canadian Tourism Commission — will accompany Kevin Bourassa and Joe Varnell, the first gay couple to be married in Canada, as they receive a “hero award” from the forum.

This is a job for juxtapose!

The United States wants to give two teams of Canadian snipers the Bronze Star, a decoration for bravery, for their work in rooting out Taliban and al-Qaeda holdouts in eastern Afghanistan, but Canadian defence officials put the medals on hold, the National Post has learned.
The five snipers spent 19 days fighting alongside the scout platoon of the United States Army’s 187th “Rakkasan” brigade last month, clearing out diehard fighters from the mountains near Gardez in eastern Afghanistan.
The Americans were so impressed by the Canadian snipers that they recommended them for medals after the battle.
Sources told the Post that U.S. General Warren Edwards had already signed the recommendation for five Bronze Stars for the sniper teams, drawn from 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, last month.
Gen. Edwards, deputy commanding general of coalition land forces in Afghanistan, had recommended three Canadians for a Bronze Star and two for a Bronze Star with distinction.
The night before the troops were to be awarded the medals, about three weeks ago, Canadian military officials in Ottawa put the decorations on hold, according to a U.S. Army source in Afghanistan.
The Canadian military told their U.S. counterparts to wait before awarding the medals for reasons of “Canadian protocol.”
Spokesmen for the Department of National Defence would not comment on the award last night, but a source within the department said the medals are on hold while the military decides whether or not to award the men a similar Canadian decoration.
However, Dr. David Bercuson, director of the Centre of Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary, said the real reason for the delay was likely official squeamishness.

What a pathetic excuse for a country we live in.

CBC;

One man, a 55-year-old chemist, claimed he was in charge of an experiment to test the effect of deadly nerve gas on political prisoners.
“He said he was involved in the killing of two people – one who did not expire for 2� hours, and the second didn’t die till 3� hours had passed,” Cooper told CBC for a documentary airing Wednesday night on the radio program Dispatches.
Other defectors told him of “mass starvations, gruesome experimentations, and yes, as we now are beginning to learn and to confirm, gas chambers,” he said.
Soon Ok Lee, a North Korean now living in the United States, said she spent years in a political prison camp before escaping.
“When I was in jail, there was at least once or twice in the prison camp, chemical testing on humans that I witnessed,” she said.

Via NealeNews

HUMAN RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS
CHAPTER I – GENERAL PROVISIONS

1 . Every human being has a right to life, and to personal security, inviolability and freedom.

2. Every human being whose life is in peril has a right to assistance.

3. Every person is the possessor of the fundamental freedoms, including freedom of conscience, freedom of religion, freedom of opinion, freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly and freedom of association.

4. Every person has a right to the safeguard of his dignity, honour and reputation.

5. Every person has a right to respect for his private life

6. Every person has a right to the peaceful enjoyment and free disposition of his property, except to the extent provided by law.

7.�A person’s home is inviolable.

8. No one may enter upon the property of another or take anything therefrom without his express or implied consent.

9. Every person has a right to non-disclosure of confidential information.

10. Every person has a right to a job at Wal-Mart

Keep this story in the back of your mind the next time someone tells you that only the state should be trusted with our fresh water resources. BBC;

India’s western state of Maharashtra has told banana and sugar cane farmers they will not get water for irrigation if they have more than two children.
The state’s water minister says the move will help curb the rising population and solve water shortages. The upper house of the state’s parliament has backed the bill and it will go to the lower house on Monday. Water shortages in the past few years have caused droughts that have led to hundreds of farmers committing suicide.
The scheme is the brainchild of state water resources minister, Ajit Pawar, who is the nephew of the federal agriculture minister, Sharad Pawar. The bill’s backers say it is needed because water resources are static while the population is continuing to rise. The bill also requires all banana and sugar cane farmers, regardless of child numbers, to use drip or sprinkling systems of irrigation within five year or lose their supply.
The bill is targeting the crops because of the large amount of water they require.
Sharad Joshi, founder of the farmers’ association in Maharashtra and the farmers’ coordination committee nationwide, said: “If the Maharashtra government is imposing restrictions on agriculture and asking farmers to implement drip irrigation, it should also make finances available, at least in the form of credit.”
If the bill is approved into law it will not apply to farmers who already have more than two children.
Maharashtra is agriculturally one of India’s most advanced states but has suffered bad droughts over the past few years.

Kind of them to allow for existing kids.
This is no totalitarian state – India is the world’s largest democracy. For all the criticism leveled at their one child rule, the Chinese at least had the intellectual honesty to simply force families to abort the surplus.

Havana (VNA) – Jack Chi-con Chow, Deputy Director of the World Health Organisation (WHO), after returning from a visit to Cuba, praised the country’s primary healthcare services as a model for other countries to employ. The WHO official highlighted the fact that Cuba’s healthcare network is intended to reach every citizen and has been kept running constantly. He said that given its encouraging experiences in combating HIV/AIDS, Cuba should make more active contributions to devising a global strategy against the disease. Jack Chi hailed the country’s regular HIV/AIDS campaigns which have drawn the voluntary participation of people from all walks of life, especially young people. One such campaign calls on people to learn to live with HIV/AIDS. He reiterated WHO’s commitment to maintain its cooperation with Cuba. While in Cuba, the delegation visited the Los Cocos health centre which provides free treatment for AIDS patients and other clinical facilities.

Photos are of El Hospital Clinico Quirurgico de la Habana.source
More, in English.