Letters to the editor

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Dear Editor,

I am writing this letter due to the great concern I have regarding health care to the people of Plaster Rock and surrounding rural areas. As the recent death of one of our community members has shown, the new "system" is not working. I'm sure if we knew the time frame from her initial contact with the hospital nurses and the time of her death, more than an hour would had elapsed before she even arrived in Grand Falls. This is not the fault of the EMT's on duty, this is the fault of the entire health care system we now have in place for our small community and surrounding area.

My heart goes out to the family of Ginger DeWitt, as well as the EMT's involved with her care the night she became ill. Its my understanding that our ambulance is frequently, {ie:daily}, situated in Arthurette, and even so far as Florenceville at times. When this happens, another ambulance, usually from the Grand Falls area, will be sitting in New Denmark or Blue Bell to cover our area, which extends to Nictau and beyond.

John McGarry made the comment on the news that people will have access to a hospital within 30 minutes of 911 contact. There is no way the ambulance could even reach Nictau from their base station in 30 minutes, let alone travel all the way from Arthurette or Blue Bell. Obviously he has no idea as to the area our ambulance covers. I would love to have the opportunity to show him how extensive this area is. Perhaps he would like to foot the cost of gas to take a tour of our area? The people in this area are expected to travel for health care, but at what cost? Our MLA, Larry Kennedy, has proven to us that he is just a typical politician. He has failed miserably in his position, and its time to step down. Perhaps Dr. Barry Wecker would be better suited for this title........... At least he believes tax payers have the right to quality health care.

The people of Plaster Rock to Nictau, Arthurette, Wapske, O'Dell and beyond better dust off their insurance policies. Tobique Valley Hospital should be changed to Death Valley.

A very frustrated health care user