LETTER

Stats Canadais talking to us

 

Although the announcement from Stats Canada last week seemed to be centred on the fact that about every second person now alive in Canada will have some brush with cancer in their lifetime, another statement by them was just as shocking: dementia in elders has increased by 21% -- giving all of Canada 400,000 seniors with dementia right now. It’s increasing faster than expected, like climate change!

I wonder how prepared we are for this?  Our health system, for sure, but even our family life and our own attitudes – and our own expectations for ourselves?

Second, I wonder why there isn’t more outcry to find out the reason(s) for this – why so much cancer and dementia in the modern world? Is it what we are eating and breathing? Is it our lifestyles? We think our age is the climax of human civilization – and in many ways it is, but is all our electronics, instant food, hormones in water, rare earths in the atmosphere actually killing us? There is an editorial for the Bulletin!

But let’s start with health care! In the Outaouais. We have to re-power our rural hospitals and health boards, for one.  Centralization is a guarantee of failure in any crisis.

Roberta Hall
Aylmer