NDP asking gov’t for accountability on healthcare crisis

By Alejandra Pulido-Guzman - Lethbridge Herald on May 26, 2022.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDapulido@lethbridgeherald.com

NDP Health Critic David Shepherd and NDP Finance Critic Shannon Phillips are demanding a series of steps to improve accountability and transparency from the UCP on the growing crisis in healthcare.
“Health minister Jason Copping provides a weekly briefing about COVID- 19 where he takes very few questions from the media and continually makes an argument that the health system is operating near normal. There is nothing normal about the crisis that we are experiencing,” said Shepherd during a press conference Wednesday.
He said the Red Deer hospital had 14 ambulances lined up outside the emergency department just a few weeks ago and they are currently diverting their surgeries to other locations which is putting pressure on surgeries to be cancelled and diverted across the province.
“The health care crisis has expanded beyond COVID-19 the UCP must transparently tell Albertans what is happening and what will be done to address it,” said Shepherd.
He said they are calling on Minister Copping to provide weekly reporting on doctor recruitment and departures.
“We know that doctors are leaving Alberta at record rates, the number of doctors accepting new patients through primary care networks has been cut in half in the last two years,” said Shepherd.
He said when people do not have a family doctor they become more reliant on emergency rooms which are clearly not able to meet the demand right now.
“Second Minister Copping must provide weekly updates on EMS wait times. Albertans no longer have certainty that an ambulance is able to arrive when they need one,” said Shepherd.
He said the UCP must tell Albertans how bad the situation is and the exact and concrete steps they intend to take to fix.
“Third the UCP must report on cancelled and diverted surgeries across the province. The health minister says we are operating near pre pandemic level, but has provided no detail on how diverted surgeries from Red Deer are impacting other communities and where other surgeries are being cancelled and diverted,” said Shepherd.
He said the interim CEO of Alberta Health Services must be present to provide technical information at all weekly briefings.
“The UCP chose to fire Doctor Verna Yiu and in the wake of that disastrous decision the crisis in healthcare has only gotten worse. AHS has lost its leadership at the worst time,” said Shepherd.
He said the chief medical officer of health provides Albertans with information about population health from related to the pandemic, but Albertans need more information about the details of how the health system is working on the ground level.
“We are in healthcare crisis in the UCP must tell Albertans honestly what is happening and how they are going to work to address it. We believe that providing frequent updates on doctor recruitment ambulance wait times and cancelled integrated surgeries is an important in essential first step,” said Shepherd.
Phillips said Lethbridge has experience the healthcare crisis first-hand.
“We have 43,000 residents in my community who do not have access to a family doctor, this of course puts more strain on the emergency department,” said Phillips.
She added that shortages of doctors in other communities such as Medicine Hat puts more pressure on Lethbridge.
“I have been raising the alarm calling on the UCP to present a plan for more than six months, actually it’s been pretty much a year now, but they have done nothing,” said Phillips.
She said the Lethbridge community is doing everything it can to fix this crisis in healthcare, but cannot be successful without the one organization who has the power to fix it which is the provincial government.
“Not only are the UCP absent from this crisis, they are actively making it worse with each passing week and month they continue to wage war on healthcare workers, including doctors nurses and allied professionals,” said Phillips.
She said that while healthcare workers sound the alarm about the current crisis, their concerns are downplayed by the UCP, they are contradicted and bullied by the UCP.
“Folks are burned out, they are not feeling the respect that they need to feel from the provincial government. The pandemic was a traumatic event for health care workers and it was made worse by the UCP’s mishandling of COVID-19,” said Phillips.  
She said healthcare workers should not have to do this alone, they must have a government that supports them.
“It is clear that the UCP do not, but an NDP government would. UCP have spent so much time focusing on their internal power struggles that they have completely neglected this crisis and abandoned the healthcare heroes serving Albertans through it,” said Phillips.

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