One Calgary Voter Becomes The Advocate-Equalizer

A change in name was in order.

The original intent I had for this blog was for it to be a platform for me to write articles about the things that were important to me as a voter in the city of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. I began by writing articles on local, provincial, and federal politics and news items.

Well, as tends to happen in life, things changed. After doing an investigation on mefloquine and the impact it has had on Canadian veterans, and on vets from around the world, I was moved to action and decided to become an advocate for them.

That idea then evolved into the International mefloquine/tafenoquine Advocates Network (IMTAN), through which I hope to raise awareness and education efforts across the globe. This group is open to anyone whose life has been forever changed because of mefloquine or tafenoquine.

Veterans the largest group.

As a group, military personnel make up the largest group of people with chronic quinoline encephalopathy, or quinism. There are a number of advocacy groups for these veterans worldwide, but there are very few, if any, advocacy groups for non-military personnel.

Every year, tens of thousands of people travel to malaria zones to go on vacation, on business, or as part of a humanitarian relief effort. Since 1985, millions of these people may have taken mefloquine as a prophylactic or as a treatment for malaria. The number of people since then who have fallen victim to it is unknown, but the number will be significant.

Attention missionaries and vacation travellers.

This group is for them as well, so that they might have the chance to learn from the veterans who have suffered, and learned what to do to ease that suffering. It will give them a voice that they as yet have not had, and give them the opportunity to call for and seek the justice they also deserve.

Clearly “One Calgary Voter” no longer fit the bill, so I made a change. I wanted it to state who I am and what I’m doing, so I chose “The Advocate-Equalizer”. I was a fan of “The Equalizer” when it ran on TV in the mid 1980’s, and it is entirely appropriate. Although I can’t guarantee the type of results Robert McCall got every week, I am there to help those who have the odds stacked against them.

I apologize for any confusion this may initially cause, but I think that this just makes more sense. I think you will too.

D.B.