Border Banter with Benoit-Leipert: Perspective is everything

resemble some of the nicer establishments here in Canada.

complications.

2017

Every so often, I come across a person who really knows how to put things into perspective.

I was fortunate enough to have a conversation with an amazing young woman last week, about her experiences in Kenya.

(see story on Page 3)

I have never conducted an interview that nearly brought me to tears, in over 15 years of journalism, but I suppose there’s a first time for everything.

Madison Blore told me about the health and dental system in Kenya. We talked for nearly an hour because I had about a million questions for her.

She talked about the contrast between the public hospital/dental center, where she spent most of her time in Kenya and the private dental offices, which

The difference is that only about five per cent of Kenyans can afford to visit the nicer clinics, which have cleaner conditions and the proper equipment, and perform preventative dental procedures, not just emergency ones.

Most people there don’t ever learn how to care for their teeth, and it can lead to major

Like the elderly man who came in with a bandage over his eye. Upon removing the bandage, the medical staff realized his eyeball had come out of its socket due to an infection that travelled from an infected tooth in his upper jaw, through his sinus cavity.

He was treated at the hospital, but after a couple more weeks of pain, he died due to the infection. Had he lived, he likely wouldn’t have been able to afford his medical bill.

In Canada, we can visit a medical professional, regardless of our economic status. Our son recently hurt his wrist while playing soccer. I took him to the hospital for an x-ray, and we heard back a week later that he had fractured his scaphoid bone.

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