SPEAKOUT

Let patients have lower prices

I'D LIKE to comment on the surgery center. I don't understand why we don't limit the number of hotel room beds and we don't limit the number of restaurants and we don't limit the number of shopping centers or other businesses, but we want to limit the number of operating rooms. The more operating rooms there are, the prices should be lower. Jim Wente, the CEO of Southeast, said in the article that there's no doubt that a surgery center can do surgeries cheaper for patients, so why not let the patients have the opportunity to have cheaper prices?

Making money, or healing others?

IN A recently published letter to the editor defending physicians, Laurie Bittle of Cape Girardeau said in part, "Why would anyone choose to be a doctor if it wasn't going to provide a substantial income?" So much for the Hippocratic oath.

Hotel tax could have negative impact

I READ the article in the Missourian about Dale Nitzschke asking the City Council for help for the new university campus they plan where the seminary was. I don't know about other families who travel feel about this, but I think your costs of travel today are already excessively high when you consider the price of motels and food and different areas that you want to tour without the city adding twice as much hotel tax. It will get to the point where people won't want to come to Cape when they know they're going to have to pay so much tax on their lodging.

They come in many forms

A FACETIOUS Speak Out caller recently poked fun at a comment pointing out that Cape and the surrounding area are being invaded by squirrels. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that Southeast Missourian readers have been forewarned many times about the possibility that alien invaders could come in many shapes. To surmise that they have taken squirrel shape is not nuts.

Books, movies honor canine heroes

I SYMPATHIZE with the Speak Out caller who said there should be a monument paying tribute to canines that participated in America's wars. Haven't there already been books written and movies made about the dogs of war?

City should tackle weed problems

I WOULD hope that the city can see fit to do something about the high weeds around the abandoned church on Mill Street in the north end of town. This is absolutely ludicrous to let something go like this. These weeds are over waist high. If I'm not mistaken, the city has an ordinance against high weeds. Apparently, this building has been abandoned. I think the city should either make the owners cut the grass or the city do it and send them a tax bill.

REPLY: What about these weeds (see photo) in downtown Cape Girardeau alongside the old Marquette Hotel?

Turn lane needed for new school

NOW THAT the construction is completed on the new Notre Dame High School and school is about to start, I was wondering when the highway department is going to put a turn lane on Route K to accommodate the increased traffic flow.

A bad day for the presidency

YOU KNOW, I don't care about Kenneth Starr's investigation anymore. He's a loose-cannon bureaucrat. What makes me feel really bad is that Lewinsky was a gold digger, and my president was an ignoramus. I'm sorry that office is being tainted. This is a bad day for the presidency.

Heartfelt thanks for hospital efforts

I DO agree with Laurie Bittle that we have many fine, expert, dedicated physicians here in Cape Girardeau, but I do get a bit weary of the whining of some of them at how long it took to become a practicing physician. Who among us started at the top of the financial ladder just out of high school? None that I know of. Auto dealers, insurance agents, financial consultants, real estate brokers, attorneys, engineers, farmers, grocers, bankers, motels and hotels operators, trucking operators, funeral home directors and newspaper executives, just to name a few, have spent many long hours and years to accomplish more than a mediocre living, and they continue to do so. Yet these 19 investors, according the article of July 26 in the Southeast Missourian, would have a projected profit of $2.7 million for 1999 for a new, free-standing ambulatory surgery center in Cape Girardeau. And at the sacrifice of whom? And the answer is: our two hospitals, which offer all services and are open 24 hours of the day each day of the year. Each person on the executive board of both hospitals deserve our heartfelt thanks and support for their continued efforts to keep them under local ownership and management.