Imagine for a moment that your pet dog, Rufus, is sick.
Doggy Doctor Inc. is happy to take Rufus for a week — but only if you promise not to pop in to see what kind of care he's getting.
Would you leave him?
Of course, not. You care too much about Rufus to trust him to any business that doesn't want you to see how it operates.
If you wouldn't accept that kind of treatment for your dog, why would you take it for your mother?
That concept is key in the ongoing debate over assisted-living facilities with shoddy — even deadly — safety records.
In Florida, family members are free to visit. But there are efforts to keep regulators and watchdogs at bay — even as troubling reports of neglect and abuse continue to mount.
Last week, state leaders vowed to get serious. It is way past time.
For two years now, newspapers have detailed disturbing problems at assisted-living facilities in Florida — a state that bills itself as retirement paradise.
We're talking about Alzheimer's patients left to wander to their deaths. Residents missing meals. The chronically ill going days, sometimes weeks, without medication.
In the Miami Herald's "Neglected to Death" series, the paper found 70 residents died from neglect or abuse in less than a decade.
To say nothing of the cases of unnecessary illness and pain.
Our elders deserve better. We all do.
Yet reform efforts have stalled.
In fact, a task force that Gov. Rick Scott convened to probe this issue looked more like a PR operation for the industry than a watchdog for the people.
Part of this group's No. 1 recommendation was to "recognize that most residents are currently being well taken care of under the current regulatory environment."
Pay no attention to the corpses.
Recommendation No. 2 stressed that punishing shoddy operators is really just a "punitive approach … not the best way to elevate quality across the ALF community."
Perhaps they want gold stars for residents that aren't killed.
This would all be laughable if the stakes weren't so high.
