story161

As I read the Longmoore's article "Stingy gov't holds health boards' feet to fire(1)" I felt sick again. Till now, I have always appreciated Longmoore's positioning on health and nursing issues; but today, I have to make an exception. In this article, Longmoore blames the government for being stingy in not providing adequate funding to the health districts, and she blames the districts for being secretive in drawing their health plans. In particular, she states that the government told Living Sky Health District to find $2 million to improve its finances and that boards have been told they will be removed from office if their health plans or budgets will leak out prior to their approval by the government.

I ask myself if this is the way we promote democracy in our health care system, that is by designing top down budgets, by threatening to fire people, and by being secretive in the management of our public resources. Timothy Shire was quite pointed when he expressed the double standards of health boards and the phoniness of their mission statements(2). In addition, Longmoore suggests that the current cost of management is too high, that relevant savings can be obtained by having fewer districts, and she concludes her article by challenging the boards to make the tough decisions to amalgamate(3).

Longmoore is missing the boat altogether and she reminds me of the Tin Pot dictators who are paid the "big buck" to make the tough decisions(4) "black or white" or more appropriately "fire or not to fire." Longmoore should know by now that our government is not stingy, rather it is just decrepit and void of any idea or vision for the future. She should also know that boards are puppets of both the Saskatchewan Association of Health Organizations and the government(5). Therefore, her contention that boards should make the tough decisions to amalgamate doesn't hold a bit, and it shows a further regression in the mentality of our leadership to be obsessed in saving money at all costs(6). And in so doing, our government wastes more money for saving more money, concentrates more power in our Tin Pot dictators to make the hard decisions, that is to "fire or not to fire" people, and further contributes to the erosion of our individual rights.

We must create an environment which empowers our people and which supports their creativity at work, at home and in their communities. We don't need to save money when we have a government which cheats its own people and erodes its individual rights.

Endnotes

Quote by Donella Meadows "challenging a paradigm is not a part-time job. It is not sufficient to make your point once and then blame the world for not getting it. The world has a vested interest in, a commitment to, not getting it. The point has to be made patiently and repeatedly, day after day after day" ftp://sysdyn.mit.edu/ftp/sdep/Roadmaps/RM1/D-4143-1.pdf http://iisd1.iisd.ca/pcdf/meadows/default.htm

General reference: Articles by Mario deSantis published by Ensign

1. Stingy gov't holds health boards' feet to fire, by Rosalee Longmoore, The StarPhoenix, May 4, 2000, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Rosalee Longmoore is president of the Saskatchewan Union of Nurses

2. The Not To Hidden Message of Dirt, by Timothy Shire, April 28, 2000

3. The Saga of Health Reform: Pat Atkinson Wants Fewer Health Boards and Fully Appointed Boards, by Mario deSantis and reviewed by James deSantis, October 16, 1999

4. NEED OF TRANSFORMATIONAL CHANGES IN SASKATCHEWAN: Healthcare Reform and New Economic Policies, Part 2. What happened to the Saskatchewan Vision for Health? by Mario deSantis, October 22, 1998

5. The Big Question for Saskatchewan Health Care: Underfunding or Mismanagement? By Mario deSantis, March 5, 2000

6. The closure of the Plains Health Centre: The $50 million overrun and the gimmick of saving money in health care, by Mario deSantis, December 19, 1999