Letters to the editor: How come Government can't do more for cancer sufferers?

A reader asks why the Government can't do more for people with cancer. Photo / Getty Images

Cancer kills people.

It has killed and continues to kill many hundreds of Kiwis each year, many of them needing life-saving drugs and medication to help them beat the cancer or give them extended quality of life.

They ask the government and Pharmac to help them and too often get a big fat nothing.

And yet the Government spends millions of dollars, if not running into billions by now, providing Covid-19 wage subsidy schemes and many other various bailouts.

How many have died from Covid since January 2020?

If the Government can spend billions without the blink of an eyelid, how come it can't help cancer sufferers whose pleas for help would only be a fraction being spent on Covid?

B Conning
Brookfield

Shared path solutions

Not all cyclists agreed with the proposed shared on-road path solution (News, March 15).

The on-road path would not be fit for all-wheel user groups. The remaining group all travelling over 20km/h would have to use the road and mix it with cars.

In order to fit the shared path, all the safe space would be removed, cyclist-kill zones created, as seen with the 15th Ave road upgrade disaster and the Ngatai Rd cycle path, creating door zones and reduced safe car passing for on-road users.

The best solution is to build the off-road path for kids, families, slow powered scooters, mobility scooters, etc, and tweak the road for safe cycling, scooters, e-bikes, etc, that travel 20 to 45km/h, by adding proper spaced cycle lanes and traffic calming measures.

This type of shared path solution is seen working in Taupo, Napier, Queenstown, Wanaka, etc, all over NZ.

As such, the Pilot Bay boardwalk should also be ripped up and replaced with a wider, shared solution connecting Marine Parade.

Job done.

Shane Plummer
Bureta

Cycleways rethink needed

It is great to see the city having second thoughts on these expensive cycleways.

Those who want them want others who don't use them to subsidise their construction and ACC costs when they fall off or get hit by cars because there are cyclists who don't obey the road rules with no accountability.

With rates rising out of control, the council's role is for infrastructure and if extras are wanted by some, then pay.

Put number plates on bikes and register them, then riders become identifiable for traffic infringements, etc.

Graham Holloway
Gate Pa

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