Toronto Tooth Crown

Government business ventures bite the dust — on the taxpayer's dime

The government has no business in the brew rooms of the nation. Or so it would seem, with the news that sales of New Brunswick’s private-label beer have tanked.

Two years after two government-brewed and marketed beers — Selection Lager and Selection Light — hit the shelves, their popularity has fallen flat and NB Liquor is canning the products.

“Production will end,” a sober spokeswoman Nora Lacey said of the Crown corporation’s brew made by Moosehead Breweries in Saint John.

Introduced under the former Liberal government in March 2009, the private-label beer was the only Crown-owned product of its kind in Canada. But it doesn’t represent the only time elected officials have gambled with public money — and lost.

Governments, in fact, seem to have a knack for getting into business ventures that fizzle. Here are a few more through the years:

In a real pickle

It was a bad case of cucumber envy that spawned Newfoundland’s infamous greenhouse caper in the late 1980s. Apparently, the province’s veggie growers were coming up short, at least compared to Ontario farmers.

“Neither the price nor taste of a tomato or a cantaloupe you buy at a St. John’s supermarket matches what you can find at Toronto’s Kensington Market,” the government pointed out as it prepared to dig up millions to subsidize a hydroponic greenhouse.

Creator Philip Sprung, whose business venture had already failed in Alberta, boasted he could grow a supersized cucumber in six days. Just the ticket, thought then-premier Brian Peckford, to put his province on the world’s produce map, and grow a few jobs in the process.

No one paid much attention to a market survey indicating the average Newfoundlander eats only half a cuke a year. Nor did anyone do the math. The green giants cost $1.10 to grow but sold wholesale for half that. Less than three years later, the Sprung greenhouse — dubbed “Peckford’s Pickle Palace” — went belly up, leaving the province $14 million in the red.

Racing into red ink

A nifty little sports car called the Bricklin raced into New Brunswick’s bad books, financially and politically speaking.

American businessman Malcolm Bricklin was looking for backers to produce his pricey gull-wing door toy in the mid-1970s, and then-premier Richard Hatfield was quickly smitten.

Fuelled by taxpayers’ money, an assembly line was set up in Saint John for the Bricklin. But the car was faster than the factory that made it, and production levels failed to yield a profit. Only 2,854 cars were built before the company went into receivership, leaving the New Brunswick government with a $23 million debt. Stung by the failure, Hatfield made a beeline for the exit door of the premier’s office.

Dental Implants Helping To Restore Missing Teeth With Success ...

The idea of replacing missing teeth is centuries old. Mummified remains from an antiquated Mayan civilization clearly show seashells embedded in their jaws and these were possibly the very first human dental implants. The procedure practiced nowadays was first used in nineteen fifty-seven and in recent times the methods and technology have been greatly developed and improved.

Teeth lost through bad dental hygiene, aging or trauma and injury can radically age a face. The gaps left in a tooth line are unsightly and tend to leave a face looking drawn and haggard. People are inclined to be very self-conscious about these gaps and sometimes become over sensitive about them.

There is however a number of ways that people can fix this problem on a permanent basis. To improve their facial features and ensure that their oral skeletal structure is stable and will function properly these gaps need to be attended to and filled.

Numerous factors need to be determined at the first consultation such as overall general and oral health, their jawbone height and density. For people who are in good health and have the necessary bone height and healthy gums the success rate for dental implants is well into ninety percent. There are however people who are considered at risk such as diabetics or those who have osteoporosis, people having chemotherapy treatments or who smoke.

There are a number of reasons why people may choose to have implants instead of old fashioned dentures or bridges. Implants are secure and will not move when one is talking or eating and also help to slow jawbone shrinkage that occurs with age. They stand alone and are therefore tooth saving and are not attached to any healthy teeth as with bridges.

The unique property of titanium to bond successfully with living bone has made it a metal of choice for artificial tooth roots. This metal is very rarely rejected by the body. Using specially developed computer programs a dentist is able to precisely plot a proposed inserted root position to cause the least amount of invasive damage to underlying nerves and sinuses. More than one tooth can be attached to an implant and five to six implants could hold a full set of teeth.

Normally done under local anesthetic this procedure entails an incision into a person’s gum and a tiny hole drilled into their jawbone. An artificial titanium root is inserted into this hole and the area around it closed up. For three to six months the gum is left to heal and the root and bone to bond before a post is screwed into its root. These posts have zirconium abutments that add a luster to ceramic crowns that resembles that of normal teeth. Once a crown has been made from a cast impression it is glued onto its post.

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