By Anne Davis
HSA member and transition house worker

The call comes late at night.  A woman is weeping; she says she has been beaten.  Its not the first time and the attacks are more brutal each time.  She is hurting and scared and doesnt know what to do.  She thought her children were sleeping but now she knows the oldest child was awake and listening; he is also hurting and scared.  Her partner has stormed out of the house; she doesnt know when he will return or what his mood will be when he does.  She doesnt know what to do.

This week is National Medicare Week and a time to celebrate a defining feature of Canada.

And this year the timing could not be more critical.

Promoters of for-profit, privatized health care are on the offensive. Key figures in the federal government have made calls to dismantle national Medicare and end federal health transfers to the provinces.

Are you concerned about the BC government's introduction of hospital user fees? Worried about the state of Home and Community Care for seniors and disabilities? Troubled by the growth of for-profit clinics and their legal attack on Medicare?

Federal Liberal Health Critic Ujjal Dosanjh has organized a Special Town Hall meeting on the future of Canadian Health Care to in Vancouver to launch a national dialogue on how to best defend, strengthen and improve the health care system over the course of the next decade.

Tomorrow night, please join fellow health science professionals in a celebration of the life of Kully Sekhon.

Kully was a highly respected Victoria-area social worker who helped thousands of people during the course of her career in acute, residential, and community care.

When Kullys life was cut short by cancer last fall, her colleagues came together to propose an education fund in her memory ... a fund that would offer scholarships to all professionals working with the elderly.

The Health Sciences Association is adding the unions voice to concerns raised by a group of concerned advocates for community living services and supports.

Hundreds of HSA members across the province participated in Sunday's Run for the Cure. Charmaine Nathan (medical radiation clinical educator, St. Paul's Hospital) brought her daughter. Send us yourphotos! If we use your photo on our website or in The Report magazine, we'll send you a gift package.

Send your photos to jdavis@hsabc.org 

The fifth annual Sisters in Spirit Vigil will take place October 4 across Canada to honour murdered and missing Aboriginal women and their families.

Sisters in Spirit (SIS) is an initiative launched by the Native Womens Association of Canada (NWAC) to address the issue of the hundreds of Aboriginal women and girls who have either disappeared or have been found murdered in Canada over the past few decades. The SIS initiative has worked to identify root causes, trends and circumstances of violence that have led to these disappearances and deaths.

This Sunday, October 3, join us in the annual Run for the Cure.

Its not too late to join our team!  Visit HSAs website and follow the links to the Breast Cancer Foundations Run registration page.

This year, HSA President Reid Johnson will be running with Fraser Valley members at the Abbotsford Run.

Look for HSAs booth at the Run in your community.  Send us your photos of the Run: if we publish your photo in The Report magazine or on our website, well send you a gift.

As BC leaders in the fight to end breast cancer, the Health Sciences Association of BC is an active participant in the annual Run for the Cure, the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation's most important fundraising event of the year.

As health sciences professionals, HSA members are the key health professionals breast cancer patients count on for the diagnosis and treatment of, and rehabilitation from breast cancer.

September 6: Labour Day Picnic: A celebration of solidarity
Join HSA, the BC Federation of Labour and friends for a fun and relaxing family day at the annual Labour Day Picnic

Monday, September 6, 11 am to 2 pm
Central Park in Burnaby (Kingsway between Boundary and Patterson) -- a 5-minute stroll from adjacent Patterson Skytrain Station