Healthcare budget does not focus on real problem, says Friends of Medicare

By ANNA SMITH Local Journalism Initiative on March 1, 2025.

Friends of Medicare’s Chris Gallaway expressed his disappointment in the direction of Healthcare in the province, following the 2025 Budget.

He explained that from his time listening to various residents and healthcare workers in the province, he feels that the solution to issues in the province is obvious, but the government is not implementing it.

“What I hear from Albertans is that they’re worried about accessing the health care that they need,” said Gallaway.

“Heading into the budget, we had a call for a plan for capacity and for the frontline workforce, and we didn’t see either of those things in the budget,” said Gallaway. “Instead, we saw a budget that doesn’t keep up with population and inflation growth. We saw a budget that continues to throw hundreds of millions of dollars at for-profit providers like surgical centres and others, and we didn’t see anything for the frontline workforce.”

Gallaway reiterated that the problem lies with a lack of recruitment and retention in the workforce, something that he feels has not been addressed in favour of discussions of the province’s growing population.

Surveys from AMA, from the nurses from HSA, reflect this, said Gallaway, showing many workers are considering retirement or pursuing out-of-province moves.

“We hear it every day that healthcare workers are burnt out,” said Gallaway. They’re working short they don’t know how much longer they can keep doing this for, and there was nothing in the budget to address that urgency that healthcare workers are feeling. So overall, pretty disappointed.”

He expressed concern of a lack of details on plans to build healthcare infrastructure, or in the case of spaces like the Calgary Cancer Centre, to staff them. Concern for a lack of beds to keep up with the increased number of Albertans was also raised.

“The one concerning thing we’ve heard from the government is thinking about leasing out our infrastructure,” said Gallaway. “We own hospitals across the province, and they’re talking about turning those facilities from Alberta Health Services over to Alberta infrastructure, and then looking at different models for how those will be used. That is a terrifying move towards private hospitals that we’re worried about.”

The budget does offer various numbers for funding for projects, such as $5 million over two years to enhance intensive care unit capacity in both Medicine Hat and Lethbridge and introduce a catheterization lab at the Chinook Regional Hospital, but Gallaway said that he does not believe these will be sufficient funding to address the problems he is seeing.

“I’m glad the Red Deer Hospital project is still moving forward, which is good. It’s long overdue and long needed. We’re glad that that’s still there, though we don’t have totally clear timelines on when it’ll be done, but it is underway,” said Gallaway.

He said that while he is pleased to see what healthcare projects were detailed on the budget line, he said he is concerned it is not keeping up with demand.

“Those things they’ve previously announced are good, but they’re just such small items versus the bigger problem,” said Gallaway.