EDITOR’S NOTE: Following is a slightly condensed version of a prepared statement, titled “Poverty in Our Times: Wasted Lives,” which was distributed to attendees just before a talk by Dr. Olson Huff at a Critical Issues Luncheon Forum May 21 that was sponsored by Leadership Asheville Forums in Asheville.
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By OLSON HUFF, M.D.

The pervasive and persistent nature of poverty has often obscured its toxic nature to all of society.

Throughout history, wasted lives, shattered dreams and lost minds have robbed all of us of untold opportunities. Yet, in the spirt of intermittent attempts to raise the issue and declare “war” on poverty, the numbers of those living on the trash heaps of existence, worldwide, grows.

One cannot help but think of the startling image from the movie “A Christmas Carol” and the ghost of Christmas yet to come, sheltering in his massive dark cloak three gaunt children: “poverty, ignorance and greed.”

These are the images of poverty that ought to burn themselves into our consciousnesses and drive us to respond. The very survival of civilization may rest more on doing so than we think ....

Some of you may remember the movie of the late 1950s, “On the Beach.” The fading scenes in the film were of a tattered Salvation Army banner which read, “There is still time, brother.”

I hope we can think that there is still time to model a civilization that cares deeply enough about human beings to truly declare “war” on poverty and drive it into oblivion.