Thursday, July 9, 2009

What went wrong in Dalton McGuinty's Liberal health monopoly?

What's this... more lies about Canadians who are forced to go to the United States for treatment, because universal medical care was not available in their own country? Hey, didn't you all hear U.S. Democrat Mike Dukakis claim several days ago that this is all untrue? This never happens!! Canadians do not need to go to the United States for health care, because it is freely available in Canada!
Karena Walter wrote in "His life began and ended in Buffalo", (St. Catharines Standard, Jul.9, 2009):

" Charlie Campbell's birth and death certificates are his only distinct connection with the United States.

The lifelong resident of Niagara-on-the-Lake was sent across the border to die last month because a neurosurgeon wasn't available in Canada.

Eighty-four years ago, his mother was sent to the same Buffalo hospital to give birth to him because there was no room in hospitals on this side of the border.

While Campbell, who by all accounts had a great sense of humour, may have appreciated the irony, his family wonders what went wrong on this side of the border.

They were told there was no neurosurgeon on call in Ha m i l t o n , London or Toronto after he suffered a fall.

Events unfolded on June 4 , when Campbell took his wife to her doctor, stumbled and fell. It was 11:30 a. m. and paramedics took him to St. Catharines General Hospital.

Campbell had fractured his fifth and sixth vertebrae. When his stepdaughter, Mary Jane Ciurluini, and her husband arrived at the hospital, Campbell was in a neck brace, lying tied down so he was immobile.

Ciurluini said Campbell was cognizant but in pain. The family didn't know what was happening. She said no one told them anything unless they asked.

By 8:30 p. m., he still hadn't been transferred. "We were getting antsy, you could tell he was deteriorating," she said. "That's what bothered me the most. They kept him there for so many hours in so much pain."

A half hour later, the family was told Campbell was being sent to Millard Fillmore Hospital in Buffalo.

He had been there once before.

In 1925, his mother, Hilda, was sent across the border because there was no room in a maternity ward in Niagara. Campbell was born on June 18.

Named Charles, he'd be better known as Charlie.

He grew up on the family farm in St. Davids with his mother, father, Frank, and brother Jack. The siblings were the third generation on the property.

Campbell went to Laura Secord elementary school in Niagara- on-the-Lake with his brother. In the winter months, a horse-drawn sleigh carried them to school. Once, in a story Campbell liked to tell, the horse wandered off and got stuck when the boys decided to let the horse steer itself.

"It was so cold and windy," son-in-law John Andres said. "They figured the horse had been there so often it will know where to go, so they put blankets over their heads."

They didn't make it to school that day.

Campbell s high school education at Stamford Collegiate in Niagara Falls, but left before graduating to work at Queenston Quarries.

He later moved on to CN Railway and stayed with the company for 30 years, mostly driving trucks locally. He was living the life of a bachelor.

But one day, while bartending for a St. Davids Lions Club dance, Campbell met Margaret, a widow with five grown children.

His bachelor days were over.

They married in 1974 and Campbell, just shy of 50, inherited an instant family.

"He was a husband, a father and a grandfather all on the same day,"Margaret said.

Ciurluini said Campbell had a wonderful sense of humour. Andres' wife, Linda, agreed. "He would fit right in."

Soon after getting married, Campbell was diagnosed with colon cancer and lost considerable weight.

His doctor told him to keep it off, but Campbell, tired of salads said, "If I'm going to die, I'm going to die happy."

A few years later, Campbell retired from CN at age 55. He kept active as a member of the St. Davids Volunteer Fire Department and as a longtime member of St. Saviours Anglican Church.

He and Margaret moved from their home on Highway 55 a few years ago to a new Virgil suburb.
The fall on June 4 led to his transfer to the Buffalo hospital.

"It seems unreal there wasn't one neurosurgeon on call," Ciurluini said.

Last year, 122 adult neurosurgery cases were sent from Ontario to the United States for care, according to CritiCall Ontario, which helps physicians manage patients.

The agency said it strives to keep patients as close to home as possible and in Ontario. But if resources are not immediately available and the patient needs to be treated immediately, they are sent out of province.

Ciurluini was impressed by the compassion of the staff at the Buffalo hospital. One of the nurses brought blankets, brewed a pot of coffee and even left her private cellphone for the family to use.
"When we got over to Millard Fillmore, it was like night and day," Ciurluini said.

Five doctors were in Campbell's room at 4 a. m. working to help him.

Despite their efforts, Campbell died on June 6 in a room at Millard Fillmore Hospital of acute cervical cord compression.

He was 83.

All his step-children were there with Margaret, who had to get special permission to cross the border without a passport.

The bill to OHIP was $21,381.42 US."

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Well, where to start with this? Thankfully, the American system was there to care for Campbell. Thankfully OHIP paid the bill. [So let's move on, right... hey, how about those Blue Jays, eh??]

yeah...
Let's start by asking: were local Liberal MPP's Kim Craitor or Jim Bradley asked to explain why there was no neurosurgeon available in their grand Liberal single-payer health monopoly? Not one mention of the Ontario Liberal government or its policies was made in the above St.Catharines Standard story!
C'mon, let's ask Good Ole Jim Bradley to publicly explain this outright failure of his Liberal health monopoly. Speak up, Jim - we can't hear you!! What's that... 'going to States shows that Liberal health care worked' ?!? ... oh, yes... I see! The spin - it's perfect!
Does Jim Bradley even have a coherent answer; one that doesn't include smearing Mike Harris, or the American health system?! We're all familiar with Good Ole Jim Bradley's standard, and by now tired, and irrelevant, Liberal boilerplate rhetoric: trot out fearmongering allegations about Mike Harris, and bash the Americans. The locals lap up Jimmy's pablum. No one asks Jimmy any questions. Everyone kisses Jimmy's ass. That's just the way it goes. Let the Americans deal with the overflowing victims of Jimmy's grandiose monopolist ideology.
I wonder if Bradley's kindred-spirit-buffoon-doppelganger in the States, Democrat Mike Dukakis (see: http://rightinniagara.blogspot.com/2009/07/mike-dukakis-tells-truth-about-canadian.html ) has read of Campbell's situation?
Obviously, Dukakis will have to claim that Campbell never had to go to Buffalo. It never happened!
Therefore (whew!) Jim Bradley will not have to publicly thank Buffalo's Millard Fillmore hospital for helping treat yet another exported Canadian patient. There is no need for Jim Bradley to thank the American hospitals for cleaning up after Bradley's own failed Liberal health care messes. Jim Bradley, thankfully, can continue fearmongering and smearing the U.S. system - the evil system to which Bradley's Liberals had sent Campbell. Dukakis, meanwhile, can continue to spout on about how Tommy Douglas doesn't send patients to the States. . . uh-huh.
Why is there no response to this incident, and to the myriad of others, from Jim Bradley, Kim Craitor, David Caplan, or Dalton McGuinty?
Is anyone even asking these Liberals to explain yet another failure of their health monopoly? Walters wrote there was no room for Campbell in our hospitals! Why is this happening in Liberal Ontario? Is anyone even questioning this??
Walters writes that in 2008, 122 neurosurgery cases went to the States. Mr. Bradley, can you confirm or dispute this figure?
(I wrote to Stealth Minister Jim Bradley (yesterday Jul.8, 2009) asking him: "Can your Liberal government provide any figures regarding how many Ontarians obtained medical treatment in the United States, between 2004 and 2009?
Can you provide any figures on this topic, which may be available from your Liberal government, or any of its agencies?
During this time period, how many Ontarians obtained OHIP-funded medical treatment in the United States?")
How long do you think before secretive Jim Bradley responds? Bradley, our local health care obstructionist, doesn't want to reveal how many patients are exported to the States because of his Liberal government's ideological health care incompetence! Bradley won't comment on the costs to OHIP, or why Campbell's health care was impossible to obtain in Ontario!
Why isn't anyone asking any McGuinty Liberal to comment on Ciurluini's observation:
"It seems unreal there wasn't one neurosurgeon on call"? The false promises of Ontario's Liberal health care were provided in the United States - in hospitals which would be ILLEGAL UNDER LIBERAL LAW if they were located on the Canadian side of the Niagara River!
Yes, it is FLICKING unreal. This is Liberal healthcare duplicity.
(see: http://rightinniagara.blogspot.com/2007/08/liberal-healthcare-duplicity-ontario.html)
Ignorant MPP Jim Bradley hasn't yet even bothered to explain the situation that the Feors faced here in St. Catharines -see http://rightinniagara.blogspot.com/2009/06/cancer-surgeries-delayed-in-st.html. These are failures of Jim Bradley's personal incompetent politics. When medical reality supersedes Jim Bradley's Liberal rhetoric, Jim disappears! Why has Jim Bradley still not publicly explained why his health care promises failed the Feors? Liberal healthcare duplicity is a danger to Ontarians; Liberals such as Jim Bradley should not be held harmless from the harmful effects his monopolist policies have upon patients.
Following the despicable lead of Dalton McGuinty, who walked away from cancer patient Brady (see: http://rightinniagara.blogspot.com/2007/09/youre-not-helping-me-angry-cancer.html) in the 2007 election - Ontario's Liberals are just running from crisis to crisis, from the proverbial frying pan to the fire, with no bloody idea of what they are doing. They are secretive, unaccountable and manipulative, walking away and hiding from scrutiny - and in the meantime, patients are suffering, trapped in Bradley's no-other-choice Liberal monopoly.
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