A little story about health care

As a dual citizen, (and my husband and I have each lived abroad in a third country--so, experience with 4 countries' health care systems between the 2 of us) I am often asked to compare our health care system in Manitoba with US health care.  This is an impossibility; it's like comparing anchovies with oranges.  If someone asked you to do this, you'd say, HUH?  Why?

In the US, health care is different in every state. Even more complicated, it varies enormously from one city or region to another.  (Health care in Northern Virginia, near DC, as compared to, say, the stats from Appalachian Virginia)  Health care in upstate New York or Durham, North Carolina was vastly different than when I lived in Kentucky...it varies so much in the US from one place to another and is so uneven that if you've lived in a variety of places, you know these generalizations are useless.

The same can be said about Canada--although health care is "free" here, it's actually paid for by our taxes, and there are fees on top of "free" that vary from province to province.  It's also different in each province, and again different, when comparing regions: a city, for instance, as compared to a rural area.

Just a couple days after I got diagnosed with pneumonia, one of my kids woke up in the middle of the night with something that looked a lot like mumps.  (and yes, we are fully vaccinated at our house.)

Here's my most recent CBC-Manitoba opinion piece about our experience, which ran on Saturday:
How would Manitoba handle an epidemic?

Getting your needle: The flu shot and basic cuts to health care

My article on flu shot availability ran on the CBC this weekend:
Cut in number of flu shot clinics a bad way to keep Manitobans healthy

Also, I heard that the Religious Studies Department at  the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill featured a post about my book!  (I graduated from this department in 2001 with a master's degree.)
UNC blog features From the Outside In

This is great news! Thanks, UNC, for mentioning my work.

The Vancouver Jewish Independent ran my piece on interfaith issues recently, too:
Need for Interfaith Learning

On the home front, we've just finished a long visit with grandparents--my twins were pretty sad about this...but as we turn towards colder weather in Manitoba, fewer people want to visit.  It's probably because they haven't tried out taking a walk or skating on the frozen rivers yet?  Go figure. :)

Manitoba women's health just got worse

Here's a link to my CBC opinion piece, which ran this morning.  You may recognize the photo if you are a long-time blog reader.  (That's the Professor's finger, he took the photo, he held the twin, and no, I did not get to do that more than once in the NICU)

If you don't recognize the photo, click on June 2011 to learn a little more.  The details I wrote about for this essay are perhaps more graphic than I've ever shared in a published piece before, but it was worth it. 

Many women in Manitoba have gone through similar things, and based on proposed changes to our health care system, it could just get worse.  Here's hoping others are concerned, too.  (Based on the CBC-Manitoba Facebook page and the number of times this article has already been shared, my guess is that others may agree and are plenty worried.)

Manitoba women's health just got worse