Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - August 06, 2013, Winnipeg, Manitoba C M Y K PAGE A10 EDITORIALS WINNIPEG FREE PRESS, TUESDAY, AUGUST 6, 2013 Freedom of Trade Liberty of Religion Equality of Civil Rights A 10 COMMENT EDITOR: Gerald Flood 204- 697- 7269 gerald. flood@ freepress. mb. ca winnipegfreepress. com EDITORIAL C ANADA'S premiers, facing a future of curbed federal transfers, are turning their minds to stemming the rising cost of health care. Negotiating better prices on generic drugs remains high on the list of their priorities, but the premiers looked a little deeper at where all the money in health budgets is going. At their recent premiers conference, they landed on the escalating expense of diagnostic imaging. Improving access to diagnostic tests - MRI, CT, ultrasound - was targeted a decade ago in a national accord with the former Liberal government in Ottawa. Diagnostic imaging is a factor in cutting wait times generally because a delay in refining diagnosis can delay referral to a specialist or the start of a treatment regimen. Successive federal governments transferred billions of additional dollars to the provinces for the purchase of new machines, driving up the cost of health care - diagnostic imaging now costs more than $ 22 billion annually - as provinces hired staff to keep the machines working longer hours. Doctors responded by sending many more patients into the queues for tests. A number of small studies in provinces have found some overuse and inappropriate ordering of diagnostic testing, but there have been no large- scale national studies, making broad estimations difficult. Inappropriate testing unnecessarily subjects patients to the risks inherent in radiation exposure. The Canadian Association of Radiologists, meanwhile, points out incidental findings can trigger further diagnostic testing, which often end in a benign diagnosis. The association publishes guidelines for when to order diagnostic imaging, but experience shows not all physicians adopt the rules. The premiers agreed to set common rules for ordering diagnostic tests, starting with lower back, minor head injuries and headaches. The radiologists association notes the factors behind inappropriate testing are complex: family docs are challenged to keep up with the speed of developing best practices and the way hospital resources are organized can make ordering a diagnostic image the easier triage option when ER beds are scarce. This is a case of a problem everyone suspects exists yet has been poorly documented. Physicians, CAR notes, must be free to exercise their best judgment as good medicine is science and art. The Selinger government should press doctors to respect best practice and setting national guidelines encourages that. The best check on overuse may be regular audits of physicians' ordering of tests, to ensure they can account for the routine, but costly decisions they make. T HE future of the valuable research at the Experimental Lakes Area remains hanging on federal involvement. Ontario now has pledged to cover current operating expenses of the freshwater- lakes lab east of Kenora. The Harper government needs to step up to indemnify the ELA's liability and decommissioning costs. Since the ELA was opened in 1968, the federal government has not just funded its staff, who operate the wilderness facility and conduct research, but has insured the site in Ontario against environmental mishap and for the decommissioning of work there, including returning lakes altered in longrunning studies back to their original states should the site close. Cleaning up catastrophic environmental damage, should it happen, could buckle provincial resources. Ottawa holds that duty now and if the ELA does fold, the federal government would have to remediate the lakes where experiments continue. It should continue to carry the obligation, in a tri- governmental agreement with Ontario and Manitoba. The Selinger government, meanwhile, can offer more than the token transfer of funding it now grants the International Institute for Sustainable Development - envisioned as the future manager of ELA - for work under the ELA banner. Operating costs are bound to rise at the globally respected work at the facility. That is where Manitoba can meet Ontario in a real deal. Unfair to cellular subscribers Re: Chamber voices Verizon concern ( Aug. 2). I find it somewhat offensive the cellular industry, led by Bell, Rogers and Telus, is pleading with users and Ottawa to stop the entry of a U. S. provider. For years, these three have been making excessive profits at our expense with unjustified pricing policies, and they now expect these same subscribers to help them. This is an industry that has been so unfair to subscribers over the years that provincial government have had to step in to regulate things such as contract length, contract termination and related fees. This would not have been necessary had they been treating us fairly in the first place. As for possible job losses, we always hear this threat from people who are about to have their market share reduced by competition. But the loss of jobs will come from providers who reduce their staff to maintain their profit margins and not because of the competition that should have been allowed to enter the Canadian market years ago. DOUG SIMPSON Winnipeg Humanitarian consequences As on every Aug. 6, memories of Hiroshima ( and Nagasaki) remind civil society in Canadian cities such as Winnipeg, Calgary, Toronto and others of the terrible humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons and that we must not let it happen again. Ever year, civil society must and does advance the great cause of nuclear disarmament, the end of nuclear proliferation, and total nuclear weapons elimination. Why do the leaders of countries not hear our voices? Global expenditure on nuclear weapons is in the trillions of dollars. That money could be used for real human needs in social and economic development. In a democracy should governments not represent the people? We, civil society, want an end to nuclear weapons and nuclear terror and devastation. MARGARET MAIER Winnipeg Attacking the less privileged The government payments that Roslyn Kunin's freeloading 58 per cent receive include Old Age Security, guaranteed- income supplements, Canada Pension Plan benefits, Employment Insurance, grants, bursaries and social assistance, to name a few ( Have we turned Canada into a nation of freeloaders? July 29). It is obvious that Canada is not a homogenous society with every citizen being at the same stage of their working lives. Over the course of one's life, circumstances and situations vary and change. Kunin herself admits for a decade she and her husband were trying to get educated and into careers while raising two kids. During this time, presumably, they were receiving some sort of government assistance or reporting low taxable incomes or both. It is a shame Kunin, who is a member of the Order of Canada, would resort to partial truths and incomplete disclosures in her attempt to promote a tired and invalid argument. What is even more shameful is some of the most privileged among us openly attack the poor and underprivileged, the middle class, the young and the old, the vulnerable and anyone else they may see as standing in between themselves and one more dollar in their pocket. CRAIG TULLOCH Winnipeg Unaffordable for the poor Your July 24 editorial Condo redux hits the nail on the head when it says city council's waffling on the condo subsidy is " hardly an endorsement of the idea that well- paid, full- time councillors are better equipped to focus on civic problems than the part- time representatives they replaced in 1992." We need to remember what purpose municipal government is intended to serve: to provide easily accessible local representatives who are in tune with the community's needs. The way in which council is set up, to most citizens an exclusive and alien entity, makes this just about impossible, despite the best efforts of some individual members. And so we end up with councillors endorsing nonsensical policies such as subsidizing condo development in an already over- heated market. A recent study by Canso Investment shows how the Canadian housing market is getting more and more unaffordable and unsustainable, mainly due to the availability of cheap money via low interest rates and the federal government's deregulation of mortgages. Winnipeg, while more affordable than most cities, still has a median multiple ( median housing price divided by median household income) of 3.6, which is considered relatively unaffordable. We also have a continuing decline in rental housing stock and increase in rental prices. City council should be more attuned to the real needs of our community: the availability of affordable housing. GREG FURMANIUK Winnipeg Lengthen turn signals When sitting in frustration at the corner of Lagimodiere and Regent and waiting to turn, I repeatedly tell my wife that the green- arrow turn signal is way too short. It is on long enough to let three vehicles pass. A fourth vehicle usually goes through on the yellow and a fifth vehicle often turns on a red light, thus creating a situation that is not only frustrating but also dangerous. Steve Nieuwenburg's July 31 letter, Opening the bottleneck , points to empirical evidence a shorter turning signal light is a bottleneck that slows down traffic. I have ample anecdotal evidence of this hypotheses. I live in the McAllen, Tex., area in the winter. The McAllen turning signal lights are more than twice as long as Winnipeg's. Drivers do sit for a longer time at a red light, but they know that when the turn light comes on, they are going to be able to get through even if they are six or seven cars back. I find the McAllen traffic system less stressful and frustrating than Winnipeg's. McAllen's system is also much safer, because I see far fewer vehicles turning on yellow and red lights. KEN SIGURDSON Pinawa Bolstering his praise Re: Quebec shows progressive side on assisted death ( Aug. 2). It is no surprise a progressive thinker such as Dr. W. Gifford- Jones would applaud Quebec's forward thinking in regards to assisted death. But Gifford- Jones could have bolstered his praise of Quebec's progressive nature by including the fact Quebec is the only province that has a vaccine injury or death compensation plan. RICK HISCO Winnipeg Parallels to alcohol Thank you for Robert Sharpe's July 30 letter, Regulating marijuana , regarding the decriminalization of marijuana. The only point Sharpe misses is a comparison of the results of current government attitudes to pot with those toward alcohol prohibition in North America in the 1920s and 1930s, which encouraged the growth and success of organized crime. MARILYN BOYLE Winnipeg HAVE YOUR SAY: The Free Press welcomes letters from readers. Include the author's name, address and telephone number. Letters may be edited. Letters to the Editor, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, R2X 3B6. Fax 204- 697- 7412. Email letters@ freepress. mb. ca. Letters represent the opinions of their writers and do not reflect the opinions of the Winnipeg Free Press or its staff. �� LETTER OF THE DAY I greatly appreciate the Aug. 2 article by Bill Redekop, our provincial rural historian, as I will call him, about the fine buildings of Carberry ( Fine buildings that shouldn't have been ). I lived in Brandon for a number of years and visited Carberry a few times but never saw the town through Redekop's eyes. Pity. If Redekop has not had a book published collecting his rural columns, I respectfully suggest he and the Free Press should do so immediately. These days I am somewhat confined to the city, so I find it most welcome to get out of its environs, smell the hay and enjoy the open skies of our province by way of these articles. CHRIS KENNEDY Winnipeg Excessive testing is wasteful ELA footdragging Heritage buildings line the east side of Carberry's Main Street. Manitoba through Redekop's eyes A_ 10_ Aug- 06- 13_ FP_ 01. indd A10 8/ 5/ 13 5: 11: 49 PM ;