Philip M. Traynor

U.S. health-care system trails other nations

In response to the June 13 letter on Canada's health insurance system, it is interesting to note that, whatever the shortcomings of the Canadian system, Canadians have longer life expectancy and a lower infant mortality rate than residents of the United States.

If our present system is so superior, why do we rank behind many other countries, including Sweden and Germany, in these statistics?

As I understand it, President Obama's health insurance plan does have a partial involvement of the government for those who cannot qualify for the private health insurance programs. Germany and Japan both have successful health insurance schemes that utilize both public and private plans.

Dissent is unpatriotic?

In response to Christopher G. Tasy (letter April 24):

Thanks for running Amy Goodman's column. She is first-class. But I'll always miss Molly Ivins. If dissent is unpatriotic, then those Germans who supported Hitler during World War II were patriots. What kind of value is that? National polls and honking horns at the Peace Corner, Blackstone and Shaw avenues, indicate that the "fringe" includes the great majority of citizens.

I'm not sure how to define "madman." But someone who attacks a defenseless nation that never threatened your own country and uses white phosphorus and depleted uranium, which also harms our own soldiers, to kill 655,000 of that country's civilians, including mothers and their children, is immoral. Family values, anyone?

Take Care Health Systems Expands Treatment for Skin Conditions and Minor Injuries

Take Care Health Systems, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Walgreens (NYSE:WAG) (NASDAQ:WAG) and the largest and most comprehensive provider of convenient care clinics and worksite health and wellness centers in the country, is now offering a new set of procedures for skin conditions and minor injury treatments.

As part of this expansion of services, Take Care Clinics now offer the following procedures:

Wart removal with Cryotherapy Skin tag removal Closure of minor cuts with Dermabond® Treatment of skin irritations (Contact Dermatitis) Expanded scope of skin evaluation and treatment for skin infections, injuries and rashes

New Letter to Rangel, Waxman, Miller from National Seniors Coalition Outlines Concerns With House Tri-Committee Health Reform Bill

In a new letter to the three key leaders shaping the developing U.S. House of Representatives' health reform bill - Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel (D-NY), Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Education and Labor Chairman George Miller (D-CA) - the Coalition to Protect Senior Care (CPSC) expressed concern that the legislative discussion draft, as now proposed, could harm seniors' care, cut thousands of key frontline care jobs, and undermine the ability to sustain quality improvement programs already benefiting patients nationwide.

"As front-line caregivers - those who provide nearly 80 percent of direct patient care in America's nursing homes - we at the Coalition to Protect Senior Care (CPSC) are writing to ask for your help in ensuring that the health care reform debate now at hand stay focused on the fact that adequate, stable Medicare funding and patient outcomes go hand in hand," says the letter to Reps. Rangel, Waxman and Miller. "From our perspective, what is at stake in this

Darrell V. Imperatrice

Age: 82

Occupation: Retired. Taught school for 35 years.

Hobbies: Playing golf, riding dirt motorcycle in the mountains, fixing things, going to the ocean in our travel trailer.