Why would any doctor want to stay in Alberta the way they’re treated?
By Lethbridge Herald on June 26, 2024.
Editor:
I woke up this morning expecting to see news of MLA Eric Bouchard being asked to resign his riding, and an apology in large print from Danielle Smith, for the vile words that were used in regard to Alberta Doctors.
The UCP has sunk to a new low. I am getting tired of the constant outrage required at this Provincial government. I will not be surprised to see an exodus of physicians from Alberta.
Why would any new ones locate here if that is how the Premier views them.
Patricia Meller
Lethbridge
7-6
Not the whole story here. One reason many are leaving, that they can’t talk about, is the long lines of people in their clinics demanding prescriptions for opioid drugs.
If they cannot talk about it how did you learn about this… are they writing about this on the walls in Tim Horton washroom stalls? ,
Yes. They’re not talking about it, so I made it up.
It’s important for authoritarians for everyone to remain afraid. Like Buckwheat, here, where everything is an NDP conspiracy: “They’re not talking about it but the NDP are driving away doctors to make the UCP appear incompetent.”
The doctors in my world aren’t dumb enough to believe that, so why do you?
Such a sad condemnation without the context of fact. Your expectations when you wake up are astounding. Please elaborate on your NDP “hit piece” so others who have some common sense can discern just what the h you are talking about. And no, I don’t live in a cave.
The comments in question were made a Town Hall Meeting in Calgary sponsored by Mr. Bourchard’s Constituency Association, and listed on the UCP’s website. They were disgustingly reprehensible, but pretty much on point for a subset of UCP folks.
As for your request for futher information, you can follow the link below for a report on the event. It wasn’t difficult to find.
https://calgary.citynews.ca/2024/06/18/ucp-fundraising-event-alberta-doctors/
Our friends and relatives who worked in the medical industry under Lougheed and Getty certainly agree with you they never got treated like morons like these Reformers are doing since the Ralph Klein days. How stupid do they think we are? Doctors,and nurses can certainly work wherever they want to because of their importance to the people.
Supposidly you are Dr. Meller’s wife?? Regardless, NEWS FLASH – 23 (Twenty-three) new doctors recruited to Lethbridge alone, other regions getting more doctors as well…. so why are you intent on piling your manure higher, stick to reality and follow the UCP plan for restructuring our health care in our province, and then watch other provinces follow our lead.
But you have no excuse for how the ones who have left were treated in the first place, why? Can you explain why your Reform Party Pals would tear up contracts, accuse them of being the highest paid in Canada , then force more privatization down our throats, pushing the cost even higher for taxpayers to face? Where is the intelligence in that?
We always hear about the one’s who left. How many were they and where did they go? Retirement? Another location in Alberta? The USA? Europe? Another Province?? Where did they go? Let’s see the numbers..
Exactly, my Lethbridge Dr. who worked at Biggelow Fowler Clinic left because she and her husband moved back to Ireland to take care of family responsibilities there.
The 9 doctors that I helped leave under Klein went mainly to the U.S. and B.C. After about three years one doctor , who stayed , told me that he had just visited his doctor brother who had moved to B.C. While there he helped him run a barbecue for about 30 of his colleagues and their wives and husbands. They all said that it was the best thing they had ever done to get away from Klein and these Reform Party idiots, and tried to get him to follow.
There were about 2 dozen nurses also that I helped and most of them did the same thing. A doctor who came back, when he retired, because all his family was here told me that he knew that a lot of the nurses went to Florida and years later a young man told me that he was from Edmonton but grew up in Florida when Klein kicked his mother out, as he put it, that’s where they went , he came back to marry his childhood sweetheart and was glad that Albertans had kicked them out. I wonder what he thinks now?
One group of five doctors I knew went to Texas and formed a clinic working with oil workers. Two years later they were interviewed on TV by the CBC. They stated that they didn’t like all the paper work they were required to complete due their privatization system, and having to appear in court to try to help their patients get money from these insurance companies they deserved to be paid was a nightmare, yet it was a lot better than working in Alberta under Ralph Klein and watching him close hospitals, close hospital beds ,and cut 5,000 nursing positions was really stupid. He knew absolutely nothing about how a healthcare system works. Apparently no one told Klein that doctors can’t exist without nurses.
Now while Danielle Smith has nothing but praise for what Klein did to this province she is doing the same thing and fools like you might find yourself looking for medical help down the road you can’t get, but I doubt you ever thought about that did you? Letting them treat you like a moron is all you know, right?
We were told there were 14,783 who left the industry and most that I knew including family members changed careers, including my next door neighbour and a nephew and it’s no secret that Alberta had never fully recovered from the disaster Klein created when Jason Kenney began his attack on them once again and look at the mess we are now in? Yet these guys insist on making themselves look as dumb as they can with their idiotic comments to try to defend them, don’t they?
I think we are going to see some massive lawsuits launched against these fake conservatives and their supporters are asking to be part of it, aren’t they? As our lawyer friends point out they have absolutely nothing to back their stupid comments trying to defend these Reformers when all the true facts are against them, aren’t they?
How do you compare the oil wealth of Alberta to Alaska and Norway when it’s hopeless and makes you look like a damn fool for believing the continued lies that times are tough when they have been building these massive savings accounts and we are in financial ruin?
But then Reformers have always been famous for spreading their lies using scare tactics just like Pierre Poilievre is doing, you can bet ignorant Albertans will elect him and like with Smith wish they hadn’t when he takes their Public Healthcare System away from them. I bet they can’t wait to find themselves paying $800. to $1,000. per month each for their healthcare coverage like my American Relatives are, can you?
What would you tell a doctor who wants to retire and has a young doctor from Manitoba who wants to take over his practice, yet after spending 3 months with the doctor to learn the ropes, announced that he was going back to Manitoba because he doesn’t like how these Reformers have been treating our doctors for nurses and Manitoba was smart enough to get rid of their Reformers and elected an NDP government that he could now live with?
At coffee yesterday my senior Conservative friends want Reformer Danielle Smith to explain to them how she is going stop Trudeau from providing them with the Dental Program they desperately need and signed up for? Why is she proving that not only isn’t she a true Conservative there is nothing Canadian about her either, is there?
Let’s see ,unlike the true conservatives we proudly supported ,she treats our doctors, nurses, teachers and students like third class citizens and fires our healthcare executives, continues to give away our oil and corporate tax wealth, wants to kick out our RCMP and eliminate the $171 million Ottawa provides Albertans to help pay for their services, wants Ottawa to stop transferring our municipalities funds to help them survive because she can’t be bothered to fund them properly while she helps the rich become a lot richer.
She thinks bashing Trudeau is what her ignorant supporters want her to do, yet the recent NDP election proves how many Conservatives have had enough of these Reformers and want to see them gone, doesn’t it?
I never thought I would ever see the day that I would vote NDP but I have since our family ,who spent countless hours volunteering for Lougheed and Getty governments and dad donated $30,000. to their party vowed to never support Ralph Klein from knowing him personally since 1960, and even members of Klein’s own family agreed with us and didn’t either.
What are you putting in your coffee these days? From your idiotic blabber it doesn’t do much for you, except that you seem to take joy in multiple posts of “nothing”!
Much like the space between your ears.
So while the truth is that 40,000 people in Lethbridge don’t have a family doctor and you think that they have nothing to worry about 23 doctors will save them while we just found out this week that Hinton just lost 5 of their 10 doctors and are in a horrific mess. What should we tell them? “Don’t worry these Reformers who created the mess will save them”. After living in 10 small rural communities for 24 years in Alberta I haven’t forgotten how difficult it is to staff the medical centres and hospitals, but I doubt you care, right? We know these Reformers don’t care they are ones trying to shut them down. Why else would you hire a Former Saskatchewan Finance Minister who was credited with closing 52 rural hospitals in Saskatchewan and getting their NDP government defeated?
While people provide you with facts you have nothing just like the lawyers state, but find it smart to pass them off with some mindless comments and think that’s good enough, yet who do you think you’re fooling it certainly isn’t anyone I know? Isn’t sad that apparently you don’t have the type of friends that I do , you might learn something.
For 29 years I have been involved with a seniors club with members from all walks of life and I have learned a lot from them, especially the lawyers, retired police officers, oilmen, doctors, nurses, teachers and former members of the Lougheed and Getty governments.
Have you forgotten how my parents and two sisters spent countless hours volunteering for the Lougheed and Getty governments. A brother in-law voluntarily flew the government plane for them in his spare time. Lougheed’s energy minister, Bill Dickie, was a brother in-law of one of my uncles and dad donated around $30,000. to the Alberta Conservative Party over the years, yet Klein almost killed him with his energy cuts. The same Ralph Klein we had known since 1960 when his mother Flo and my mother became good friends.
The conservative MLAs I got to know all taught me to never trust a Reformer, they destroy jobs, not create them and help the rich steal the peoples wealth and that’s exactly what I have seen them do and when you have ignorant Albertans believing every lie they feed them this is the type of financial mess you can expect
When former premier Don Getty told me in 2003 that inviting Liberal Ralph Klein into the Conservative Party like did was dumbest mistake he ever made I certainly agreed and then when Albertans elected another Liberal in Jason Kenney I was furious and as a lawyer friend said “ There is nothing dumber than an Albertan going around bragging about being a good conservative and finding it smart to bad mouth Liberals while he is supporting one. Do you think a skunk would smell any different if you called it a cat? Why do you think Reformers are okay if you call them a Conservative? Good question isn’t it?
So why have you supported Liberal Klein and Kenney and ignored the fact that they would do anything to get elected even if it meant changing parties just like they did and Danielle Smith did also , or it it just one more thing for you to ignore with you ignorant comments? I don’t think it makes you look very smart , does it?
Your bad attempt at exaggeration is pathetic…. where are you dreaming up these false mumbers?