Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - March 15, 2001, Winnipeg, Manitoba A10 tin 2001 the farm Paradox Grain and oilseed producers Are hurting because the world Market for their commodities is glutted and the prices Are wretchedly prices Are not Likely to recover until and european governments Stop subsidizing the greatest help Canadas government can give its producers is to negotiate hard and get those subsidies this will be achieved Farmers turned up at the Manitoba on Ottawa parliament Hill and in other cities yester Day to Call for More fed eral financial the Manitoba government agrees with the govern ments of Ontario and Quebec that Ottawa should find another million for Farmers on top of the million announced two weeks the Manitoba government announced its contribution to the farm Aid package this assuring Farmers of million in combined Federal and provincial support this the demonstrating Farmers echoed the demand of provincial governments for a doubling of the Aid the Farmers make a Good they Are exceptionally efficient producers of first rate they would be Able to cover their costs and show a hand some profit if they were not confronted with the Export subsidy programs of the United states and it seems grotesquely unfair that More Good Farmers should be squeezed out of business because of a transatlantic farm products Price and Grain and oilseed Farmers Are not Able to Tell canadians when the hurting will when they will return to profitability and cease appealing for government support to keep them tax payers could easily agree to help Grain and oilseed producers across a Brief period of Low prices if they knew that the problem was being that part of the remains Canada should be using the full Force of its Trade diplomacy to curb and european Grain Export when Canada opens the subject of the and Europe open the subject of eggs and Dairy products because Canada strictly controls production of those commodities and in effect closes its Market to Canada is not Able to stand on a free Trade principle in farm commodities because Canada exercises Protection of the most aggressive kind in selected for the Benefit of selected to fight hard for fair Market conditions for Grain and oilseed Canada would have to expose its Dairy and poultry producers to import and Canadian governments have not been willing to face the political consequences of doing in Canada sacrifices its Grain and oilseed producers in order to save its Dairy and egg who were not seen on the legislature grounds demand ing Cash a strictly rational farm Trade policy would give canadians Market driven Trade in All farm com without Export subsidies and without import Short of that politically unpalatable Canada should be willing to Trade away some of its egg and poultry Protection in Exchange for a Glimmer of Hope for Grain and oilseed if that Road were transitional financial help could be erasing history tank fire and artillery shells could not destroy two colossal Buddhas carved into a Cliff face in so that country islamic fundamentalist Taliban government this week bored holes into filled those holes with dynamite and blew them to the destruction of the Buddhas was an atrocity against the human heritage and the common civilization of there no court that can try this kind of atrocity committed by a and if there it would be a crowded the destruction of the Buddhas followed a Taliban decree that All idolatrous images in Afghanistan should be the two Buddhas were simply the most impressive representation of that destructive there is no Way of knowing How Many other works of Art in Afghanistan were islam is an iconoclastic but it is important to note that no other islamic government has Ever committed such an atrocity and that no Presentay islamic government gave its Blessing to what the Taliban has the two Buddhas can never be recovered or something May still be Learned from this exercise in fanatical the leaders of the Taliban understand completely that these pre islamic figures Are part of Afghanistan history they it is a part of Afghanistan history that they would rather not in they Are perhaps not so much different from the rest of history can be an uncomfortable it reminds us of where we came and gives us an indication of where we should be however much we might dislike its the easy thing is to destroy revise forget the Taliban attempt to erase history is dramatic and but in it is not much differ ent than the More Subtle and sophisticated erosion of history that occurs too frequently in the nations that now condemn editorials Freedom of Trade Liberty of religion Equality of civil rights sorry to alarm or but your Canada hurts vie naturally ass nip you vjerj5 Ion drugs Winnipeg turns a Blind Eye studies in other countries have shown that medical errors mistakes made by health practitioners kill thousands of patients every a Well publicized american issued in november 1999 by the National Academy of sciences Institute of estimated to people die annually because of mistakes made by Doc tors and medical errors kill More people than do motor vehicle accidents or breast can Catherine Mitchell these mistakes Hap pen in Canada too a Van Couver woman lived with an abdominal abscess for months before the surgeon reopened her to find a wad of Gauze he left in during the first a Quebec teenager died of an intravenous overdose Given while he was being treated for a broken there Are numerous untold but generally we hear of these through reporting of court canadians can Only guess at How Many errors Are made every Day in hospitals or other medical facilities because there has been no real research Here on the some say As Many As canadians die from medical errors but that is Little better than a based on numbers gathered in studies in the United Australia and which brings me to after a Day and a half of phoning a variety of hospitals Ive concluded that one could die wait ing to find out about medical the question was simple How Many errors were made and what is that As a percentage of admissions a Call to the health sciences Centre led me to conversations with three other people at the Winnipeg regional health i was referred to a doctor at the health sciences but in still waiting for some in also still waiting for word from Boni face and the most helpful was the patient representative at cancer care Manito who told me that while medical errors Are reported and there is no separate category of data on As a statistics cannot be nor reviewed for be they the Rise and fall from year to year or whether there is a particular element of care such As delivery of medication that is More some of that is set to change As a result of a recent recommendation by a National accreditation notes Mary canadians Are sitting in the dark Ages of medical medical errors Are 1 under what is recorded is hidden from the and people blithely walk into medical putting their lives in the hands of doctors and medical with Little information on the skill of those giving cutting open their bodies or recommending and administering doses of potentially lethal patients dont ask enough questions and medical practitioners dont offer enough theres no reason to think were any safer Here in Canada than says Philip a director of the newly formed Institute for Safe medication Hebert says those who have done the research on medical errors believe As few As 10 per cent Are an associate professor at the University of Toronto Centre for is one of a handful of canadians in a movement pushing for better reporting of they envision hospitals and other facilities employ ing a system that focuses not on fault As the current system now but to find such As medication that can then be Hebert and Many like him believe that the current system of reporting mistakes puts too much emphasis on attributing this discourages reporting and disclosure to the patients and families judge Murray Sinclair reached the same conclusion in his inquiry report on the deaths of children who underwent heart surgery in 1996 at the health sciences judge wrote mis takes most often were recorded when they result in harm and therefore Are potential Law the near misses if might prevent future errors Are generally lost in the the Institute for Safe medical practices and a second fledgling called the Canadian patient safety Ini want provincial and Federal reporting so statistics Are collected using standardized its time Canada did some of its own Hebert both groups were established after the Institute of medi Cines which prompted the president Bill Clinton to put millions into such research As Well As establishing better reporting sys tems at some in the work has barely Saskatchewan is looking at setting up a Provin Cial reporting the first in the in in still looking for someone who acknowledges the contagious disease on a Small planet the world has become a smaller place lately through Trade agreements and other political air travel is easier and More Long distance Telephone Calls Cost pennies a the internet knows no time or although it is still dominated by the English we have various free Trade much of Europe has United after a and someone is always Host ing a Trade Mission last the Dan ish ambassador to Canada and two Trade officials spoke to a group of Winnipeg business people about working whether through joint business ventures or Branch such a relationship had Likely not occurred to either country until this int to say that weve All been getting along world Trade organization events Are hardly inclusive affairs but there has been a general relaxing of Trade and marketing throughout the modern transportation and global marketing has its it has also hastened the spread of livestock diseases like Footman Mouth or Hoof and depending upon your a protectionist mood is in the air and the fear and damage int limited to the worlds current and its live As if France needed another reason to Dis Trust Footman Mouth has been discovered in that following the spread in a Northern German state has decided to Slaughter All sheep imported from there in the last three even the Patricks Day Parade in Dublin has been cancelled this year because of the threat of Footman Mouth in so Many events have been cancelled in lists of them have been compiled with tourism being even bigger global business than the potential Impact is Ridley a Winnipeg Swine genetics Busi told the free press that the foot and Mouth outbreak could Cost the company up to million in lost revenues Over the next three and half because of British govern ment Ridley cant sell its British based Breeding hogs to British hog producers or Export even if the animals Are it int just Footman Mouth that has coun tries wary of each Germany and new zealand Are at Odds Over a pamphlet about mad cow disease that the Central marketing association for German agricultural products sent to More than 33 million German the leaflet claimed the Central nervous sys tem disease scrapie has been present in new zealand sheep for 250 new sealanders say the similar to mad cow has it been found in their sheep since the new zealand agriculture and Trade minis Ter is calling the German Campaign Commer Cial sabotage and has demanded at stake is new zealand Export Market in Mutton to Worth no Brazil will double the number of health inspectors at its Border with Argentina to prevent Footman Mouth disease from contaminating brazilian last Canadas relations with Brazil were soured when Canada banned brazilian fearing mad cow it int just the worlds livestock that has been its International human this is a problem for which there seems to be no easy beyond quarantine and old old world for All the technological change and we apparently dont know How to prevent these or at the very isolate the contagion upon and ensure animal health and food if we Are shrinking Back behind our respective we should have Learned a lesson we Are being reminded of something we ought to have known All along agriculture is a vital Compo nent of the global and Nat ural resources Are valuable and often protectionism might make Citi Zens feel less but the prevention of mass plague and Slaugh Ter in the future is More Likely to Hap pen through International Winnipeg free press Winnipeg free Feis est 1872 Winnipeg Tribune est 1890 v vol 129 no 99 2001 Winnipeg free a division of newspapers division of Thomson Canada limited published seven Days a week at 1355 Mountain Manitoba r2x pm 6977000 a the Manitoba press Council Rudy email Nicholas y Patrick Flynn Deputy editor ;