Who pays for this again?

First the background:

VANCOUVER -- Immigrants with HIV account for a large portion of new infections of the disease in Canada and they're slipping between the health-care cracks, warns a recent report.

Although Citizenship and Immigration Canada is considering making HIV a reportable disease, currently it is not,meaning it is not considered a public health risk and it is not mandatory to report infections to public health officials.

The recent report by the B.C. Centre for Disease Control found that about 16 per cent of all new infections in Canada are linked to people from countries where HIV is prevalent, yet they make up only 1.5 per cent of the Canadian population.

The 2005 figure means the infection rate was almost 13 times greater for immigrants - or those connected to them - from HIV-endemic countries than for Canadians.

It's not the Black Death or anything, but I think we can all agree that HIV leads (in most cases) to AIDS, and that is both terminal, transmissible and a drain on our health care system. For the record, there is some dispute about the inevitability of the HIV-AIDS link but I include that only in the interest of balance. HIV remains a reliable predictor of AIDS, if nothing else.

The article continues:

Michael Battista, a Toronto lawyer who focuses on immigration and refugee law, said people are counselled about the dangers of spreading the disease.

"Citizenship and Immigration Canada wisely decided that people with HIV do not pose a danger to public health or safety," Battista said.

"And so I think it's on that basis that Citizenship and Immigration Canada doesn't have a strong connection to provincial health authorities in terms of reporting newcomers with HIV."

Battista believes the follow up from provincial health officials is an intrusion.

"I think there are huge privacy concerns that are raised when people with HIV go through the system, particularly given the fact that HIV is not something that is easily spread," said Battista.

Between 2002 and 2006 there were 2,567 immigration applicants who tested positive for HIV during their medical examinations among the 1.2 million immigrants to Canada accepted during the same period.

Of those HIV-positive applicants, 89 per cent were determined to be medically admissible to the country.

A person with HIV has an added burden compared to other Canadian immigrants getting into the country.A person with HIV is not inadmissable outright, but it is very difficult for HIV-positive immigrants or refugees to gain admission.

That last bit first. With the volume of people who would like into Canada, I see no reason to admit people with any serious disease, hard to get or otherwise. As well, 89% is MOST of those who try, suggesting to me that it's not as hard for them to get in as that last sentence would have us believe.

I don't personally think that anyone not a Canadian citizen has any entitlement to our health care system, and I certainly don't want waves of medical refugees fetching up on our shores, but the numbers don't seem to suggest that is happening. I am also not so concerned with privacy issues as they relate to would-be immigrants carrying a deadly infectious disease. Then again, I'm not a lawyer who makes his money from those people, so I would like to think my position is hardly surprising.

This is not all about level of physical risk from a given disease; there are financial costs associated with treatment of any of these things, and people who haven't paid into the system are an undue drain upon it. It's very nice for Citizenship and Immigration Canada to "wisely" decide who is entitled to our taxpayer money, but last I checked those bureaucrats hadn't been elected. And there is the law on the matter as well:

A foreign national can be considered inadmissible on health grounds if they're likely to be a danger to public health or safety or could be expected to cause excessive demands on health or social services.

I was reading something yesterday about the reality of the costs of things and the dangers of deciding that those costs don't exist or are irrelevant. The Gods of the Copybook Headings will tell you "If you don't work you die." but it seems that a passing familiarity with the basic economics of the world, let alone our taxpayer-funded system are of little import to our "elites".

He got one thing right at least.

When the agent accuses Khadr of crying to avoid interrogation, Khadr tells the agent between gasping sobs, "You don't care about me."

Damned straight I don't. I wonder if he was this much of a cry-baby in Taliban camp in Pakistan but somehow I doubt it. The solution to this would have been a third bullet, since the first two were inadequate for the job; now we'll never be rid of this guy.

Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?

I like to think that this is a victory for some kind of sense in this country, but it's flawed for sure.

The father of two testified he thought his family was being attacked by home invaders when a police team swarmed his house on March 2, 2007.

Nine police officers smashed down the front door of Parasiris's home with a battering ram in the pre-dawn raid.

Tessier and his colleagues ran upstairs to the master bedroom with their weapons drawn.

Parasiris testified his only thoughts during the chaos were to protect his wife and children.

He grabbed his .357 Magnum and was confronted by Tessier, who was dressed in dark colours with nothing indicating he was a police officer, according to testimony in the trial.

I take only the most obvious facts into account in making my appraisal of this being a good result, that is some guy waking up disoriented in the wee hours of the morning with a bunch of guys in ninja/SWAT gear thumping up his stairs waving guns and yelling.

Apparently the cops were yelling "Police, warrant" or some such, which is all well and good, but a) buddy had to hear that, b) he had to register it (he was rudely awakened after all) and c) he had to believe it.

A jury of his peers have already ruled that his action was reasonable in the circumstances, and I for one agree. He's most certainly going to be charged (and convicted) for not following the safe storage laws mandated for restricted firearms, which is definitely what happened here. He would not have been in any position to wake up and shoot some intruder otherwise. It's also highly questionable that he kept loaded firearms in a house with children, but these matters are before the courts as I write this so 'nuff said on that.

For the record, I share his appraisal of the .357 revolver as the ideal CQB weapon for countering home invasions. It will stop anyone in their tracks, is more manageable than a .44 for follow-up shots, and as a revolver you can keep it loaded forever with no poxy magazine-spring fatigue to cramp your style.

No; in case you suspected sarcasm, I'm quite serious. It is very much against Canadian law to be prepared to defend yourself effectively so I will not suggest you rush out (to wait months or more) to get a permit to buy said pistol. You do however know, in case it's ever relevant, that a .357 Magnum is capable of taking down a fully-equipped SWAT trooper at close quarters, and your average punk home invader would be a much softer target, dusted/cracked out or not.

It is a tragedy for the family and friends of Officer Tessier that he lost his life in this manner, but it's a dangerous job and we take our chances. There are hopefully some questions being asked of the Laval PD that will avoid a repeat of this event. From a professional standpoint, it was an operational failure that this guy got the drop on him and was not neutralized as soon as he presented a weapon.

If you talk the talk, you had better be able to walk the walk; what I mean by that is if you're going to go charging in SAS style you are presumably expecting to need that sort of kinetic, lethal action, and you'd better be bloody well ready to use your training to the full. A guy swinging a gun at you certainly warrants a lethal response, and I note that Officer Tessier's fireteam partner (or whatever the cops call them) didn't empty a magazine into Mr. Parasiris, the tactically correct response to one of your buddies getting capped.

So, to sum up:

• a very unfortunate loss of a police officer in the line of duty
• an excellent precedent to reaffirm our legal right to use up to lethal force to defend ourselves and our families from home invasion, etc.
• an expose of the questionable choice of targets by the local PD
• some serious questions could be asked about all these SWAT-type officers and why they are parading around with all this kit and doing these assault operations if they aren't either properly trained for that sort of thing or not prepared to use their training when circumstances warrant.

I doubt that anyone at the trial was thinking about this the way I did, but this is after all MY blog, and I'm special as we all know...