I agree wholeheartedly with George Lupton’s position (The News, Sept. 20) concerning our new glorified redundant walk-in clinic.
If the powers that be feel that we need a walk in clinic, the option of having it at Arrowsmith Lodge with donated equipment from NRGH was far more feasible and intelligent than farming this project out to private practice and having the taxpayer fund a good portion of it to boot!
Come on people, are we this easy a mark? It seems the trend today is toward privatization of everything, slowly eroding our health care system and destroying the very principles that Tommy Douglas fought so hard for.
We are abysmally failing our seniors in particular with so little access to needed health care.
It has been my personal experience that each time I have attended the already existing clinic here in Parksville, I was sent to Nanaimo Regional General Hospital to have the problem looked after anyway. So what exactly is the point in wasting all this taxpayers’ money?
What we really need is a modest hospital in Oceanside.
This summer we were quite surprised visiting towns with a population of 10,000 or less that had their own hospital. Oceanside has a catch basin of over 50,000 people, with a large percentage of them seniors and yet we are still denied a much needed hospital.
A further slap in the face is the fact that Campbell River and Courtenay/Comox are getting new hospitals when they already have existing ones.
This whole clinic controversy is a joke strictly formulated to line the pockets of opportunistic private investors. And the chasm continues to grow between the haves and the have-nots and the middle class slowly disappears.
What we really need is glaringly obvious. Let’s abandon this whole walk in clinic nonsense and campaign louder and stronger for a hospital.
God forbid, if and when one of our loved ones doesn’t survive the current long trip to attain needed medical care, it will then be loud and clear that the medical needs of the population in Oceanside are sadly neglected.
Norma Hesby
Qualicum Beach
