Letters, Oct. 26

Privacy risks of health information

Manitobans deserve answers about how their personal health information is collected, accessed and protected. Three everyday practices warrant public scrutiny: repeatedly requesting birth dates at pharmacies; exposing historical medical records to reception staff; and requiring callers to disclose personal details to Health Links.

A Manitoba health card proves health coverage. Why must patients repeatedly disclose their birth dates to collect prescriptions? What assumptions or biases might arise from a person’s age or outdated medical history? Being classified as “authorized personnel” does not eliminate the risk of unnecessary scrutiny.

I have personally experienced the distress of a doctor’s receptionist drawing attention to a decades-old medical entry by asking, “Is this you?” A last name which had apparently been removed legally was visible again. Patients should not have to explain or relive painful chapters of their past simply because historical information appears on a screen.

Health Links raises similar questions. Why must callers provide personal details, including where they live, if these are not necessary to answer their health questions? Are birth dates and addresses truly necessary for identification in every circumstance, and are less intrusive alternatives available such as a different code?

Manitoba’s Personal Health Information Act (PHIA) establishes protections governing the collection, use and disclosure of personal health information, including limiting collection to what is necessary and access to those who need it. Are these principles being meaningfully upheld in everyday health care, or is access accepted simply because someone works in a health-care setting?

Manitoba must review pharmacy identification procedures, access to historical records and Health Links’ information requirements. Patients deserve transparency about why their information is needed, the ability to correct outdated records and meaningful accountability when privacy is compromised.

Seeking health care should never mean surrendering your dignity. Our medical histories are deeply personal. Manitobans deserve answers, accountability and meaningful protection from unnecessary exposure of their private information.

Alice Rice

Winnipeg

A self-evident truth

Re: Mitigation trumps inspiration for many voters this fall (Oct. 17)

I read with great interest Rebecca Chambers’ latest column, as I always do when it is there. I am wondering how she can reconcile a sentence like “we get what we pay for, and it isn’t worth the bragging rights” in reference to property taxes being low here, and the three closing words of the piece, “Winnipeggers deserve better.”

She has just finished explaining, quite lucidly, why we don’t.

Robert H. King

Winnipeg

Cost conscious

I fill my regular prescriptions at Costco. Each receipt clearly shows the cost plus the fee of $4.49. Manitoba pharmacies are allowed to charge the cost of the medications plus a dispensing fee.

This week I received a one-off prescription for a short-term med. One a day for seven days. I decided to drop it off at the closest pharmacy to my home, located at major grocery store.

The instructions stated one a day for five days, which caused some confusion. The pharmacy gave me five tablets and said they’d contact my doctor to clarify the mix-up. Cost of the five tablets was $14.50. The breakdown between the medication cost and fee was not shown.

The following day, the pharmacy called and said I should come and pick up the two additional tablets and that they would not charge an additional fee. The cost of two tablets: 36 cents!

This indicates that the cost of the initial five tablets was 90 cents, revealing its dispensing fee to be $13.60 — more than three times the fee charged by Costco.

Why do regulators not require all pharmacies to provide the breakdown between the cost of the meds and the dispensing fee? Transparency matters.

Stuart Gauld

Winnipeg

Real change will make roads safer

Re: Police urge caution amid pedestrian collision surge (Oct. 21)

The Winnipeg Police Service acknowledges an increase in traffic violence from drivers towards vulnerable road users but then reminds potential victims to do better — wear bright clothes, look both ways, make eye contact.

This story and these incidents should spark the city to install speed bumps, enact 30 km/h default speed limits in residential areas, build more bike lanes, narrow car lanes, and add more sidewalks. These things are proven to actually make kids and seniors safer.

I want the new city council to be bold and brave and implement evidence-based solutions — fund our neighbourhoods, fund our kids’ future, fund our seniors’ present.

Robyn Young

Winnipeg

Health care begins at home

With the provincial election approaching in 2027, the Manitoba government and all political parties must be prepared to answer these important questions:

• What concrete steps will you take to expand home care and reduce waiting lists?

• How will you provide meaningful support and respite for family caregivers?

• What is your plan to reduce hospital discharge delays caused by inadequate community and long-term care?

• What measurable commitments will you make, and how will voters hold you accountable?

Manitobans deserve clear plans, adequate funding, specific timelines, and measurable results. This is not about choosing seniors over younger patients. It is about ensuring that seniors receive appropriate care at home whenever possible, family caregivers receive the support they need, and hospital beds remain available for those requiring urgent medical treatment.

Our seniors deserve dignity, our caregivers deserve support, and every Manitoban deserves timely health care.

Yog Rahi Gupta

Winnipeg

Careful who you mix with

Re: Canada, Turkey enter 3-year ‘strategic partnership’ (Oct. 23)

President Erdogan is an authoritarian leader who has been pushing Turkey down that path for several years. A couple of months ago I listened to a radio interview with a Turkish journalist who was forced to seek refuge in Great Britain. He stated that he would likely be in prison had he not fled.

Yet Prime Minister Mark Carney appears to have adopted the view that a buck is a buck, and we shouldn’t worry about the ideology of our trading partners. The irony is delicious. If Pierre Poilievre flew to Ankara and shook Erdogan’s hand, the Liberal Party would be screaming bloody murder, but if Carney does the same thing … no problem.

If Carney wishes to sup with several devils, that’s his choice. But let’s not hear any pious prattle from the federal government about human rights.

Kurt Clyde

Winnipeg

When a war is not a war

It’s time that the media begin to clear up their language and not refer to the trade dispute between Canada and the U.S.A. as a “war.” A war is defined as a large-scale armed conflict between nations. A dispute is a disagreement, an argument between individuals or nations. I think everyone would agree that what we are witnessing is a trade dispute.

Terry Aseltine

Winnipeg