It Works If You Ignore All of the Bugs

The next time some smug Canadian riddled with national chauvinism bleats the demonstrably false line of having the best healthcare system because "America bad", remind him who we kill:

In February, Abbotsford Conservative Party MP Ed Fast introduced Bill C-314, the Mental Health Protection Act, which would quash the federal government’s (delayed) mental-health extension, without repealing the original “foreseeable death” principle. Nice try, but Sen. Stan Kutcher, prime mover of the mental-disorder expansion, says the issue is “decided.” In a culture where, to nattering nabobs, the words “slippery slope” conjure up not an avalanche, but a delightful toboggan ride.

Writing in National Review in the fall, one American commentator  called Justin Trudeau “modernity’s Doctor of Death,” whose willed expansion of MAiD makes Canada  “arguably the assisted-death capital of the world.” An exaggeration? Consider that California, with the same population as Canada, and universally regarded as a singularly progressive domain, legalized medically assisted death in 2016, just like Canada. In 2021, 486 Californians availed themselves of the program. In the same year, 10,064 Canadians ended their lives with MAiD (a term for euthanasia used only in Canada, and brazenly stolen from palliative care, where it rightly belongs.)

And indeed, the world has taken notice. One sees a proliferation of the trope that Canada “has become an international cautionary tale.” A writer for The Critic, a British magazine, alluding to bad domestic public policies that arise from good intentions instinctively adduces for example Canada’s MAiD, “originally marketed as a rational choice for sensible adults and therefore an indisputable moral good, it is now being used to kill the poor and the mentally ill as well as the physically sick and the elderly.”

Remind him who we refused to treat:

Speaking to the mother Shakina Rajendram about her then-harrowing-now-hopeful story, she recounted going into labor at 21 weeks and 5 days during pregnancy, a gestational marker that the medical community deems “not viable.” Her heart shattered as she heard that her two darling babies would receive no rescuscitation, only to be delivered to die on her chest. ...

So as a Christian mother and father with a fierce faith and belief in the power of prayer, mom Shakina and dad Kevin stormed heaven, in order to carry the babies to the 22-week threshold, inviting family, friends, church and community to pray with them. Prayer warriors on social media from all over the world kept the babies and their parents in prayer, too. ...

According to Guinness World Records, the pair are not only the most premature babies to be born, but also the lightest twins ever born. Previous titles for premature twins were held by the Ewoldt twins from Iowa, who were born at the gestational age of 22 weeks, 1 day. 

Remind him of the treatable illnesses that make a magic comeback:

The Nunavut Department of Health has declared a tuberculosis outbreak in Pond Inlet.

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The territory’s chief public health officer says there are currently five active cases and 22 latent cases of TB in the hamlet.

He says the growing number of cases suggests enhanced public health followup is needed.

Pond Inlet is on the northern end of Baffin Island and is home to more than 1,500 people.

A sensible suggestion:

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is calling for a countrywide standardized testing process that would speed up licence approvals for doctors and nurses.

Poilievre says his proposed “blue seal” testing standard would allow qualified health-care professionals to work in any province or territory that volunteers to be part of the program.

He described his plan at a press conference today, saying a model that allowed professionals to take a test and get an answer within 60 days would address Canada’s ongoing shortage of health-care professionals, such as family doctors and emergency-room nurses.

Under the existing licensing system, each province and territory has its own processes to be licensed as a doctor or nurse.