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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1986-01-29, Page 4PAGE 4. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 29,1986 Technology should be beneficial Technology started out as the greatest boon to mankind, since the discovery of fire, tokeephim warm. Somewhere along the way something’s got a little out of whack. When the first human discovered that by putting a log under a heavy load and rolling it, he took a gigantic step toward making the living of people easier. Nearly all the early advances in technology from the axe to the discovery of how to make iron added to the ease of life for all inhabitants. Perhaps the one detriment of the technology of the early age was that iron tipped spears and arrows that made hunting animals for food more efficient, also made hunting other people for conquering more efficient. Somewhere along the way, however, technology went from helping all people, to being a way that one segment of society could gain economic power at the expense of another. New inventions were adopted, not so much because they were really needed, but because someone could make a big profit from them. Take for instance the latest news that researchers in the U.S. have come up with a hormone which, when injected into dairy cattle, can increase milk production by up to 40 per cent. It will, an expert recently told the annual meeting of the Ontario Milk Board in Toronto recently, cut the number of dairy farmers in half in the next few years. In a television interview the expert made no consoling statements that this would better the lot of dairy farmers. Those left in business wouldn ’ t be any better off, he said. They’djust be able to hang on. Those who didn’t adopt the new technology would be out of business. The new technology will keep the lucky farmers just where they are and will destroy half the family farms that are doing quite well under the current standards. It will hurt rural communities that depend on the farm population. It will destroy some businesses that simply won’t have enough customers living out there on the farms. Consumers will benefit but by how much? How much does a family really spend on milk and milk products in a year anyway? Probably less than they spend on perfumes, soaps and deodorants. If people were starving and cutting the cost of milk would save lives, then there would be some real benefit in the new technology but all this would do is put a few more dollars a year into disposable income for people to buy non-essentials. The only real beneficiary of this technology will be the company that invented the process. They have done in a legal way what the street gangs in the protection racket have done illegally: told people ifyou don’t use our service, we’ll close you down. Technology too often today isn’t a case of real benefit to humanity but of blackmail on the part of a few against the many. Letter to the editor Follow your heart DEAR EDITOR. Follow your heart - have a heart for the Heart Fund. February is heart month and once again canvassing will begin in Blyth for the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Ontario. Give to the research that will save more lives. The grim reality is that heart disease and stroke kill as many Canadians as all other diseases combined. The canvassers calling on you in Blyth in the next several weeks will be: Alma Madill. Linda Stewart, Stewart Ament, Judy Brown. Mary Lou Stewart. Donna Hamm. Karen Stewart, Sheron Stadelmann, Can­ dice Howson and Mary Holland. Lois Van Vliet Chairman of the Heart and Stroke Foundation for the Village of Blyth Room for compromise on OHIP From the age of five when we first start to develop our own wills, none of us like to be told what we must do. So it is no wonder that doctors, even those who don’t extra-bill their patients over the OHIP rates, have reacted in anger against the provincial government’s attempts to ban extra billing. Last week Premier David Peterson indicated his government might be willing tocompromise on some of the harsh provisions ofthebillthatwould legislate away the right of doctors to charge more than theOHIPrates. It’s a welcome sign and there should be some softening of positions on both sides. While the majority of doctors are against the government simply because they don’t like being forced to do anything, there are also doctors who still see themselves as entrepreneurs who should be able to tocharge what the market will bear. They look with envy at the position of doctors south of the border who can earn much more than doctors here because they can set their own rates, often very high rates. They are apt to remember the “good old days’’ before universal medicare was introduced in Canada and they had less bureaucracy to deal with and nobody telling them what they could charge. They may not remember, however, how hard it was to collect bills from some customers in those days and how government medical plans meant they automatically got paid for every patient they saw. They may not remember that there were people who came to them in very bad shape because the fear of medical bills kept them away from the doctor when they should have come for immediate treatment. They may not remember that they were often unable to put someone in hospital because they couldn’t afford the high cost of a hospital stay. The Liberal governments, both in Toronto and the federal Liberals who brought in the legislation to penalize provinces that allow extrabilling, are also caught up in their own ideology. They believe, rightly, that everyone should have the right to quality health care and that while doctors, because of their high education and stress-related jobs, deserve a substantial income, they shouldn’t be able to force people to pay more than they can afford when people are in need of medical care. But they also are so committeed to the ideal that they forget another thing Canadians are committed to: freedom. There should be a way of discouraging doctors from overbilling without legislation being so authoritarian. Could not, for instance, doctors be allowed to charge more than OHIP rates but if they do, they are completely outside the plan. They would not be able to collect any money from OHIP, and their patients would have to pay the entire fee themselves. It would mean that doctors would once again have freedom but also the responsibility of collecting their own bills. It would give real incentive to doctors to remain in the plan and to patients to seek doctors who were inside the plan. Perhaps there should also be some fee such doctors should pay so taxpayers can recover the heavy subsidy we have invested in their education. The government and Health Minister Murray Elston are right in their goal but they must find a method of obtaining the goal without trampling other cherished goals such as freedom of choice. Letter from the editor Dear Readers: When people are toting up the “natural resources” of Huron county they’re apt to list the number of acres of various classes of farmland, the salt mine of Goderich, the natural beauty that makes this a tourist’s favourite for visiting and so on. We’re apt to overlook the most important natur­ al resource of all as far as development goes: the minds and imagination of our people. One of the things that makes Huron county special is that we havesuchawidemix of people. This being a prosperous, (well, as prosperous as it gets these days) farming area, naturally farmers make up a good part of the population but we also have all the regular urban jobs from garage mechanics to dress-shop owners, lawyers to plumbers. We even have a nationally-known archi­ tect’s firm. We have actors and writers and television people. We have photographers and weavers. Our children can grown up seeing a wide variety of people from all walks of life: probably a greater potential list of role models than anywhere else in the country. We’ve got so much variety, but there's room for so much more. Too often there’s the temptation on the part of everyone from consumers to politicians, to see growth (or “progress”) in terms of some nationally-known company locat­ ing in our communities. We seek industry in the form of some big company locating from Toronto or Chicago or Tokyo. We seek retail business in the form of a local outlet for a chain. Real long-term growth, how­ ever, may come by encouraging our own people to put their ideas to work. We need to find ways of helping people get started when they’ve got a good idea. Big Continued on page 6 [640523Ontariolnc.] Serving Brussels, Blyth, Auburn, Belgrave, Ethel, Londesborough, Walton and surrounding townships. P.O.Box152, P.O.Box429, Brussels, Ont. Blyth, Ont. N0G1H0 N0M1H0 887-9114 523-4792 Subscription price: $15.00; $35.00foreign. Advertising and newsdeadline: Monday 4p.m. Editor and Publisher: Keith Roulston Advertising Manager: Beverley A. Brown Production and Office Manager: Jill Roulston Second Class Mail Registration Pending