It is really terribly unfair how governments have treated doctors over the past 2 decades. At least, that is the official line the CMA board uses to justify its recently proclaimed Charter for Physicians.1 It is not about "rights," the board hastens to add. It is about our "needs," a sort of chicken soup for the demoralized professional ego.
With respect, this is becoming just a little precious. The CMA is, of course, a creature of its provincial satellites. This might, in part, explain why the majority of the CMA board members do not seem to have noticed certain critical facts, such as the fact that politicians have not actually done anything to us, save perhaps for the GST, without permission and consent from our provincial associations.
So mark me down with Nuala Kenny2 and the embarrassed ethicists, for I do not think doctors need special privileges not enjoyed by other citizens. What we do need is a national association prepared to defend our civil liberties, not one that substitutes hypocrisy when piety does not seem to be working anymore.