Organ sales
An effective way to decrease the number of people buying organs is to implement a negative-option organ-donor system such as exists in many European countries (Putting An End To Transplant Tourism - editorial, Dec. 16). Such a system enables people who are opposed to organ donation to opt out and be identified in a database. It would increase the number of organs available as polls have shown that most Canadians would donate their organs. As long as organs are scarce, desperate people will do almost anything to survive.
Silvie Lennox, Toronto
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Your editorial rightly condemns Canadians for buying kidneys abroad, where those organs might be the obtained by violence, coercion and exploitation. But you fail to recognize that most of the harm comes from criminalizing the kidney trade, rather than the trade itself.
Take the example of Iran, which allows people to sell their kidneys. There, if a patient cannot find a suitable kidney from a family member or deceased person, they apply to the national transplant association for a kidney from the living donor list. The donor is paid by the government with a co-payment from the recipient.
All that's needed to eliminate dozens of preventable deaths annually in Canada is a system of incentives and a little common sense.
Karl Hauer, Victoria
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Organ tourists should know that a study done by a major Canadian hospital found a high failure rate in overseas transplants received by Canadians. "Outcomes of Commercial Renal Transplantation: A Canadian Experience" concluded that patients considering this method of acquiring live-donated kidneys should be counselled about inherent risks and possible adverse outcomes, including diminished dialysis-free survival.
As a family who experienced the power and beauty of organ and tissue donation, the idea of individuals selling organs is repugnant. Stringent new guidelines aimed at deterring this practice are long overdue.
If more organs were available here, there would be no need to become an "organ tourist." It is incumbent on Canadians to educate themselves about organ and tissue donation and talk with their families about their wishes and concerns.
Beth and Emile Therien, Ottawa
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Room at the sin
Re (Spiritual) Help Wanted - Dec. 16: Older and well-educated men are now being sought to fill out the ranks of the Catholic priesthood. Fishermen and at least one tax collector did a pretty good job in the early days. The other 50 per cent of humanity currently being ignored as possible candidates could also help relieve the shortage.
Sally Morrow, Ottawa
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The big difference
Most of the middle class have moved down, not away (A Tale Of Two Torontos - Dec. 16). In this recession, many people who have been laid off can't find replacement jobs. They've become statistically invisible - moved in with parents or gone on the rising rates of social assistance. Maybe the big difference since the 1970s has been a change in attitude toward fair tax redistribution. This is the most effective way to reduce poverty. All it takes is political will.
Margaret Hageman, Toronto
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Best interests
The disgraceful situation facing aboriginal children in the child-welfare system hurts our hearts (The Right To Have Parents - Dec. 13). Everyone needs a home, the importance of stability cannot be overstated. As aboriginal and white women involved with the system, both as survivors of foster care and parents who have lost the right to parent our children, we are familiar with pains inflicted through forced separation of our families. Families who are poor and/or from aboriginal and racialized communities are suffering disproportionably.
It's time Canadians deepen our analysis of this crisis. Children's best interests lie in their right to maintain family bonds. For our families to thrive and stay together, we need freedom from poverty, affordable housing, childcare, programs for at-risk families, including those affected by drug use; we need committed legal representation to advocate for ourselves, and we need supports for parents after our children go into care.
Kate Kenny, on behalf of members of the Grief and Loss Education and Action Project, South Riverdale Community Health Centre, Toronto
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Munch, munch
As a poinsettia grower and gardening columnist for CBC Radio in Edmonton, I was dismayed to see the warning about the dangers of poinsettias (Hold The Joy - Dec. 16). I have eaten many poinsettia leaves over the years, in an attempt to help dispel the poisonous poinsettia myth. And while researchers have proven that poinsettias are not poisonous to people or pets, I can attest to the fact that neither are poinsettias tasty.
Jim Hole, St. Albert, Alta.
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Bricks, behaviour
As an architect contributing to the CAMH redevelopment project on Queen Street West in Toronto, I've been struck by the commentary about the impact of bricks-and-mortar projects - such as Regent Park's redevelopment - on the quality of community life (Can Bricks And Mortar Really Change Behaviour? - Dec. 2).
A consortium of architects has been working with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health community to redevelop its stigmatized Queen Street campus - once the home of "The Provincial Lunatic Asylum" - into a welcoming urban village fully integrated into the neighbourhood. The site's physical transformation is already having a profound impact as the new facilities provide a dignified, hope-filled environment specially designed to promote recovery. This project is the critically important physical manifestation of a new approach to mental illness and addiction - one in which being part of the community is part of the treatment. The impact, in turn, on the larger community - in terms of changing attitudes to people with mental illness and addictions - is one of the most exciting promises of all.
Alice Liang, Toronto
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Follow the leaders
Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty are warning about Canadians' debt burden: The suppliers of the free bar are now cautioning about the dangers of drink (Debt Alert - Dec. 14)?
Hadn't they seen what happened in the U.S. and Europe? When you drop interest rates to almost zero to keep the country from going into a depression, in an economy driven by consumer spending, what do you think is going to happen? This used to be called the piano-player defence: "I didn't know what the girls was doing with the fellas upstairs! I was just playin' the piana in the parlour!"
Richard Smiley, Anglemont, B.C.
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Thanks to the Bank of Canada's governor, I know exactly How To Win The Battle Of The Holiday Bulge (Dec. 15): quantitative easing.
John Watkinson, Peterborough, Ont.