Letters - You’ve outdone yourself this time

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Published on Tuesday, September 25, 2018

Submitted

Neepawa Banner & Press

Over the last 30 years, I’ve read a lot of stupidity in Banner editorials, but you outdo yourself when you attack regulations (Help is on the way? Aug. 31 edition, Neepawa Banner & Press)

You blast the fact that STARS cannot land at Neepawa hospital. The AgustaWestland AW139 helicopter is 54 ft. 8 in long and 45 ft. 3 in wide. The older Airbus BK117 is only slightly smaller. Take a tape measure to the hospital parking lot and be sure to allow a margin of safety. Just because someone on the highway refuses to sacrifice 10 seconds for safety, that’s no reason to sacrifice a STARS crew.

I have no idea how waste disposal regulations got into the equation but I doubt you would find a professional pilot willing to take off or land through a flock of seagulls. Even a dense flock of sparrows can shut down a jet or turbine engine.

Then, like Don Quixote at a windmill, you proceed to attack medicare, harping as usual that we should be paying a small premium. In Ontario, that “small premium” is $900 a year, in Alberta, $1200 and in B.C. up to $2000. Out of reach on my pension.

Pharmacare. You seem unaware that we have had a provincial plan since I was young enough to not need medication.  But now, during the months when I pay my deductible, medication for my wife and self takes 25 percent of our monthly income. Needless to say, I greatly appreciate Pharmacare. A person very dear to me, being treated for cancer, was prescribed a weekly pill that cost $3,500 per pill. He took it for one year, $170,000 worth. Mr. Waddell, could you pay for that out of your pocket, or would we have to let you die?

Tell me, Mr. Waddell, why do you so firmly believe that the top one percent, who own more than 50 per cent of the world’s assets, should not contribute financially to the well being of this world.

Leonard Paramor

Arden, MB