Cuts to TB program are shortsighted
Fozzy Bear once said to Kermit, "If you come to a fork in road, take it!"
Unfortunately, our Canadian government and CIDA have both declined to take such decisive action.
As a physician, unwarranted and preventable deaths are always on my radar. Such is the case with tuberculosis or TB, which, despite $20 treatments to cure, kills almost 1.5 million of our fellow citizens annually.
Our government recently applied painful cuts to Canadian programs such as TB Reach that once put us as leaders in the field. We are at a crossroads in the global fight to control and eventually eliminate TB, and restoration of our funding then leveraging other wealthy countries to do the same is critical at this critical time.
Our budgets are important but to attempt to balance them on the backs of the poorest and most ill lacks conscience and moral imperative.
Dr. Robert C. Dickson
Calgary
