Dr Kim Alexander 🍁

This is what happens when oligarchs control the *news*

Dear Prime Minister Carney, We write to you out of deep concern regarding passage of Alberta’s Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2025 (No. 2), and the threat it poses not only to Alberta’s public health care system, but to the integrity of Medicare across Canada. Canadians understand that provincial health systems are under genuine strain. We all share the goals of reducing wait times to improve access to timely care and of recruiting and retaining health care workers. We know that protecting and improving Medicare to enable healthy populations is a vital nation building project. However, Alberta’s Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2025 (No. 2) risks undermining these goals. Instead, it proposes a system where patients face financial uncertainty and where timely access to care will inevitably depend on ability to pay. Alberta’s law abandons the foundational principles on which Canada’s health care system has been built, as enshrined in the Canada Health Act. By formally enabling physicians to accept both public and private payment (dual practice) and allowing patients to be billed for medically-necessary services, this legislation enables a multi- payer, two-tier system of care that is confusing, inefficient, unfair, and expensive. This shift is unprecedented in Canada. Since 1984, when the Canada Health Act was passed, Alberta, like all provinces and territories, has upheld a single-payer model grounded in equitable access to medically necessary care based on need, not ability to pay. The Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2025 (No. 2) represents a clear departure from that shared national commitment and raises grave concerns about Alberta’s compliance with the Canada Health Act.

We are deeply concerned that Alberta’s Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2025 (No. 2) will: • Undermine equity by normalizing private payment for medically necessary care, privileging those with financial means; • Risk contravening the Canada Health Act which exists to protect universality and accessibility; • Exacerbate workforce shortages in the publicly-funded system by permitting physicians to split their practice between public pay and private pay sectors; • Set a dangerous national precedent inviting similar legislation in other provinces thereby weakening Medicare across the country. Beyond its domestic impacts, Alberta’s Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2025 (No. 2) raises uncertainty related to national treatment and market access obligations under the current CUSMA. If Alberta’s legislation opens a pathway to private duplicative insurance (covering the same medically necessary services as the publicly funded system) and for-profit investor-ownership of hospitals (delivering medically necessary care), we are concerned this could lead to US health insurance companies and hospital corporations expecting to enter Canada’s market. Notwithstanding the protections afforded by Canada’s sectoral reservations listed in CUSMA related to health care, if the US were denied entry to Canada’s market, we are concerned this could expose Canada to CUSMA’s investment and services disciplines. As Prime Minister, you have a responsibility to uphold the Canada Health Act and protect equitable access to care for all Canadians, regardless of jurisdiction. We therefore call on your government to: 1. Conduct a formal Canada Health Act compliance review of Alberta’s Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2025 (No. 2); 2. Urge the Government of Alberta to pause implementation of Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2025 (No. 2) while its impacts are assessed by Health Canada’s legal team and independent national experts; 3. Use the full range of federal tools available, including discretionary penaltie…

Yours sincerely, Dr. Melanie Bechard Chair, Canadian Doctors for Medicare Signed and endorsed by: Alberta Federation of Labour – Gil McGowan, President Alberta Union of Provincial Employees – Sandra Azocar, President BC Health Coalition – Ayendri Riddell, Director of Policy and Campaigns Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives – Peggy Nash, Executive Director Canadian Federation of Medical Students – Bryce Bogie, President Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions – Linda Silas, President Canadian Health Coalition – Jason MacLean, Chair Canadian Labour Congress – Bea Bruske, President Canadian Union of Public Employees – Mark Hancock, President Coalition Solidarité Santé – Geneviève Lamarche, coordonnatrice Congress of Union Retirees of Canada - Michael MacIsaac, President Friends of Medicare – Chris Gallaway, Executive Director Independent Voices for Safe & Effective Drugs – Colleen Fuller, Director Manitoba Health Coalition – Noah Schulz, Provincial Director Médecins québécois pour le régime public – Dr. Xavier Gauvreau, Président National Union of Public and General Employees – Bert Blundon, President New Brunswick Health Coalition – Jean-Claude Basque, Co-Chair Nova Scotia Health Coalition – Jennifer Benoit, Provincial Coordinator Ontario Health Coalition – Natalie Mehra, Executive Director PEI Health Coalition – Mary Boyd, Chair Registered Nurses Association of Ontario – Dr. Doris Grinspun, Chief Executive Officer United Nurses of Alberta – Heather Smith, President United Steelworkers – Marty Warren, National Director

🚨 Today: Canadian Doctors for Medicare sent a letter to PM Carney expressing deep concern about Alberta's law allowing patients to be billed for essential health care.

This policy endangers the integrity of Medicare for everyone across Canada.

@cdndrsformedicare.bsky.social #cdnpoli #cdnhealth 🧵

The US is a Christo-fascist state.

Cervical cancer rates higher in states with low HPV vaccination rates

RFK Jr *lies* when he says cervical cancer risk is increased in women who get the HPV vaccine.

New study: "States with high vaccination rates have seen the biggest drop in cervical cancer, while states with low vaccination rates have had little to no progress"

www.cidrap.umn.edu/human-papill...

Thinking about this further - given that cyclists are doing this anyway, what if the City contracted Cycle Toronto to manage (and pay for) hand-shovelling of cycle tracks where the original mechanical plowing has been blocked by driveway use, windrows, etc. after extraordinary snow events?

UUs also run Pink Haven, which helps trans people with things like getting gender-affirming care and relocating to safer states. www.pinkhaven.org

Rumour is shooting will start at 12pm here in #PuertoVallarta

All incoming flights were turned around and returned to origin today so we’ll see what happens tomorrow?

I’ll try to keep updating as I hear things.

#PuertaVallarta
We’re being told there may be electricity outages
Charge your phones and chargers and write down important numbers on paper.

🚨 Situación de seguridad en Jalisco: bloqueos en distintos puntos de Guadalajara, incluidos Periférico y Tabachines, así como Calzada y Periférico.
En Puerto Vallarta se registran vehículos incendiados y bloqueo del libramiento.

 
#Guadalajara #PuertoVallarta #Jalisco #Noticias 🚔📰🔥

🚨 #CódigoRojo en Jalisco. Se reportan bloqueos en la Zona Metropolitana de Guadalajara, en Periférico y Tabachines, así como en Calzada y Periférico.
En Puerto Vallarta hay vehículos incendiados y cierre del libramiento.

#Jalisco #Guadalajara #PuertoVallarta 📰🔥🚔

🚨 #CódigoRojo en Jalisco. Se reportan bloqueos en la Zona Metropolitana de Guadalajara, en Periférico y Tabachines, así como en Calzada y Periférico.
En Puerto Vallarta hay vehículos incendiados y cierre del libramiento.

#Jalisco #Guadalajara #PuertoVallarta 📰🔥🚔

If you’re in #PuertoVallarta now, make sure you contact your consulate.
You’ll want to know if there are evacuation flights

Fires in Puerto Vallarta

#PuertoVallarta on fire

They were pulled out of their car at gunpoint. They were quite literally a target?

Puerto Vallarta multiple fires

Tourists targeted as well

Started about 9or 9:39am I think.
I’m hoping I’ll be able to fly out on Tuesday 😳

We all got home safe.
But major routes all blocked by burning cars or buses.

Puerto Vallarta this morning (Sunday). Multiple fires set by cartel because local police forces captured a drug boss.

It hasn’t hit the news yet, but PV is shut down right now

Good luck have fun!

i will never accept this excuse out of a society that demands you take on 5 to 6 figures of debt to commit to a degree for a career at age 18

If you are a smoker, please reach out to your family doc, or nearest hospital with thoracic surgery and ask about lung cancer screening.

a sign pointing to the restrooms in a museum, with an unfortunately placed poster beneath saying "of Discovery, of Stories, of Ideas, of Creativity, of Culture, of Learning, of Imagination," playing on the name of the museum, which is the National Gallery of Art

must be some impressive restrooms

So you're saying ICE is incompatible with the rule of law as practiced in this nation from the founding?

Think I see a pretty easy solution here, champ.

Doctors say that vaccines protect children from dangerous diseases. A nepo baby who barbecues dogs and snorts cocaine off toilet seats says that vaccines make children vulnerable to 5G radiation. For busy parents, it can be hard to know who to trust.

Great article!

The US government has a definition via U.S. Holocaust Museum:

"What distinguishes a concentration camp from a prison (in the modern sense) is that it functions outside of a judicial system. The prisoners are not indicted or convicted of any crime by judicial process."

That's totally going to be me someday minus the Jewish 🤣