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TORONTO, Jan 16 (Reuters) – Canada’s most populous province, Ontario, plans to considerably increase its use of personal suppliers to carry out public well being providers, the premier stated on Monday, in a bid to take care of backlogs and delays in a healthcare system strained by the coronavirus pandemic.
Premier Doug Ford introduced the deliberate growth on Monday, saying: “The established order is now not acceptable. … That is one of the simplest ways to go to take the burden off the backs of the hospitals.”
The announcement comes as Ontario and different Canadian provinces wrestle to supply healthcare because the pressure on hospitals and wait lists for non-urgent procedures – which lengthened through the pandemic – keep lengthy.
Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston informed World Information on Sunday that Canada’s healthcare system is “on the ropes.”
Canada’s publicly-funded healthcare system has up to now been seen by some as a mannequin system. However critics say years of underinvestment and the pressure from the COVID-19 pandemic have stretched it to a breaking level.
Requested about Ontario’s plan Monday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stated he would “proceed to observe” that the Canada Well being Act is revered. Its tenets embrace public administration, universality and accessibility of well being care.
Ford and his ministers have insisted the province’s medical insurance program will proceed to cowl healthcare.
However critics and public well being advocates have argued increasing the usage of non-public suppliers is a step in direction of privatizing the general public well being system and dangers cannibalizing a healthcare workforce already dealing with a scarcity. Well being sector emptiness charges are the best they’ve been in years.
The Ford authorities has stated it has no plans to denationalise the healthcare system.
‘POTENTIALLY FATAL’
Ontario plans so as to add 14,000 cataract surgical procedures a yr, about 25% of the present wait listing, and make investments C$18 million ($13.4 million) in present non-public centres to fund medical imaging and sure surgical procedures.
The federal government additionally plans to introduce laws early this yr to increase the availability of sure providers and surgical procedures in these clinics.
“We’re rerouting … the simpler surgical procedures which can be taking over 50% of the capability on the hospitals and inflicting folks to attend for the intense surgical procedures as effectively,” Ford stated Monday.
Well being Minister Sylvia Jones stated sufferers might complain to the province in the event that they felt they weren’t supplied publicly lined providers on the non-public clinics.
Natalie Mehra, govt director of the Ontario Well being Coalition advocacy group, stated she was frightened this opened the door to additional privatization and that it was “laughable” to recommend it might not take well being staff from the understaffed public system.
“That is probably deadly to the general public well being system in our province and in our nation, and we’ll battle it in each attainable means,” she stated.
($1 = 1.3394 Canadian {dollars})
Reporting by Anna Mehler Paperny;
Enhancing by Denny Thomas and Deepa Babington
Our Requirements: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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