HEALTH CARE TRUMPS ALL

I am writing in hopes that this letter may reach people, empower them, and help them to understand that as we continue to sit idly by, quietly wringing in our hands in despair, people are suffering and dying due to the lack of timely health and mental health care right here in Nova Scotia.

This is not acceptable in Canada. The primary objective of Canadian healthcare policy is to “protect, promote and restore the physical and mental well-being of residents of Canada and to facilitate reasonable access to health services without financial or other barriers.” This is not happening in our province.

I do not discount the importance of environmental or economic issues, but funding improvements in those areas while disregarding the health and wellbeing of the population is a critical error in judgment. Without people, no matter what economic or environmental incentives you create, there will be no change. The people are at the heart of every issue — those very people that our politicians have sworn to serve.

The very first issue to be addressed by any political party in this provincial election should be health care. Nothing else should happen until they have ensured that every single Nova Scotian has the care they need. No more empty promises. No more talk. It is time for action. It doesn’t matter how they do it, whether they create community clinics that run five days a week and six to eight hours per day or take the money planned for electric buses and hire 100 doctors or provide incentives and higher pay to work in Nova Scotia and even more for rural areas. Either way, we are in a critical state and this is the time to address it — to stand up and say that we will no longer be silent.

C. Cote, Bridgewater