Hoping barnes will help keep hospital laundry local

By Letter to the Editor on December 20, 2019.

It is as my mum used to say “penny wise and pound foolish” to be closing the laundry at Medicine Hat Regional Hospital. People have gone over the arguments for keeping it open numerous times, but I will repeat a few.

Loss of about 40 jobs with benefits to leave Medicine Hat; extra transportation as Dirty Laundry Out Clean Laundry In puts a lot of extra semi-trucks on the highway; loss of control of carrying out our own laundry services; if something is needed in a hurry will AHS communication to a private provider work correctly?

The UCP answer is that we are going to save money. But a few years ago when we met with Cypress-Medicine Hat MLA Drew Barnes he agreed it was worth keeping the laundry and having local control.

The other argument put forward is that the laundry requires too much repair to bring it and the equipment up to par. This was self-inflicted by not putting the finances in place to do this but on the other hand putting the resources into Lethbridge by installing new tunnel washer systems.

Hopefully Barnes will put the local argument forward and I for one would give him a clean sheet.