The Ontario Health Coalition stopped by in Shelburne last Friday to hear from residents about the closing of Shelburne hospital.

One attendee asked if it is time for civil disobedience. This is the extent of the frustration citizens are feeling. They had filled that town hall to protest the closure and felt totally dissed. They signed petition. Same story. It is as if the few “decision makers” believe they know best, but so often they prove to be so wrong.

People want to know if, in the opinion of the “decision makers”, seniors are living too long and, as such, using up the resources, and so a cunning plot was devised to shift about seniors hoping the griefs that they feel at being moved around will kill them off faster thus “saving” money.

It is doubtful these seniors were the generation that abused medical resources on sniffles and the wasteful recurring six-months check-ups for young, strong, healthy citizens. Some will tell about those phone calls from doctors’ office to come in for those check-ups – sitting in waiting rooms for one to two hours, and finally spending two minutes with the doctor saying, “say aah” and “now, go home till next six months.”

The body knows when it needs medical attention. Yes, it does. Seniors are not squandering valuable medical resources on botox and such. Seniors have earned their care.

That aside, with these towns around here growing, when will the “decision makers” tell us that Orangeville hospital is over-crowded, bringing the predictable problems, and that they would have to implement that well-known exercise of tearing down and building back a hospital in, maybe, Dundalk or so.

Haven’t we heard that when they spend all the money they have they get more? And hard-working citizens pay the price in many ways. Wonder if they will give us details of where all that savings, resulting from those frequent cutbacks, donated money, fund raising money and all the other incoming monies end up.

Gloria D.G. Ramnath

Shelburne