Provision of Health Care Services
A senior Sask Party MLA said Saskatchewan citizens cannot expect the provincial government to deliver both highways and health care.
“Which do they want, highways or health care?”
– Sask Party MLA Dan D’Autremont, Government House Leader
(The Moosomin World-Spectator, August 2, 2010)
This flippant attitude toward the provision of health care services has led to the situation which we are in today:
Wait lists for surgery have grown. Here are some examples of how
surgical wait lists have grown since just 2009: in the Five Hills Health
Region, they’ve increased 4.3%; in PA Parkland, they’ve increased 12%;
in Cypress, they’ve jumped 25%; in Prairie North, they’ve leaped 66%;
and in Kelsey Trail, they’ve skyrocketed 89% (data from the Saskatchewan
Surgical Initiative, sasksurgery.ca, July 2011).
Funding for 13 long-term care homes across Saskatchewan was also cancelled.
Hospitals and health services have been shut down, including most recently in Wakaw.
Yet, at the same time, health region CEOs have experienced massive
wage increases, including the CEO of Saskatoon Health Region more than
doubling in six years, from $183,768 to over $400,000 a year.
Letter to the Editor: Medicare at risk
By Helen M. Baker, The StarPhoenix October 19, 2011
Saskatchewan folk better prepare for our children living with a private, expensive, American-style health-care system.
How could our once pro-gressive province swallow Premier Brad Wall’s and Health Minister Don McMorris’s phoney excuses for sending expensive surgeries and analyses of CT and MRI scans to private clinics and companies at the expense of medicare? (more…)
Letter to the Editor: Build health team
By Judy Denniss, The StarPhoenix October 3, 2011
It always sparks my inter-est when Health Minister Don McMorris makes public statements.
He was recently reported saying Saskatchewan has passed regulations to expand the scope for nurse practitioners, and noted the government had addressed retention and recruitment issues for one health-care classification – registered nurses.
What he doesn’t tell the general public is this: The province has also passed regulations to expand the scope for licensed practical nurses, necessitating all LPNs to complete additional education requirements. If they don’t complete the education at personal cost by a given date, they are put on an administrative leave without pay. (more…)
Data show fewer surgeries in health region:Government and health region need to explain what happened
“Both the government and health region claimed privatizing surgeries would ‘ramp up’ capacity and increase the overall volume of surgeries in the region, but that’s not what happened,” says Gordon Campbell, President of the CUPE Health Care Council. “New data analyzed by CUPE show contracting out surgeries has harmed surgical capacity.” (more…)
Questions for Candidates Running in the Provincial Election
Printable PDF of Questions for candidates
Legislative/Labour:
Essential Service legislation (Bill 5) and changes to The Trade Union Act (Bill 6) have created unfairness for all public sector workers. It took away the right to strike, and made it impossible to achieve a fair collective agreement. It took away the right to organize, and it invited employers like SAHO (Saskatchewan Association of Health Organizations) to waste thousands of tax payer dollars on media campaigns against health care workers. What are you planning to do about Bill 5 & Bill 6? (more…)
We need a carrot to get GPs
By Murray Mandryk, The Leader-Post June 3, 2011
Wakaw residents went to the legislature in May to ask for their hospital to be reopened. It was closed at the end of March due to a physician shortage.
There are only two choices for the Saskatchewan Party government when it comes to recruiting doctors – especially rural doctors: (more…)
Op-Ed: Properly fund Public Health Care
By Barbara Cape, The StarPhoenix
This appeared in the Star Phoenix on February 3, 2011.
Having access to comprehensive health-care service is important to every resident of Saskatchewan.
Unfortunately, our current government is seemingly placing more emphasis on privately delivered and privately funded health care and is, in effect, working toward the removal of the public option for the people of Saskatchewan. (more…)
Curing Saskatchewan’s doctor shortage
Why doctors are finding it hard to make small-town Saskatchewan home
Iryn Tushabe — The Carillon (University of Regina)
Last updated: February 18, 2011 7:13 pm
REGINA (CUP) — The shortage of doctors in rural Saskatchewan has reached critical levels, and the province is doing everything it can to attract and keep physicians in smaller towns.
Alison Thompson is a second-year medical student at the University of Saskatchewan. She is also president of the Student Medical Society of Saskatchewan. She thinks many doctors are fleeing from the province’s small centres because of two issues — recruitment and retention.
“Saskatchewan actively recruits doctors from abroad. Therefore we tend to get lots of international graduates. I definitely know that some come and just find that it is not a good fit and is quite different from where they originally practiced,” she said. “Others, after coming to Saskatchewan, find other locations to practice that are more financially lucrative, offer more practice flexibility, or include work in a larger centre. (more…)
Privatization Threats
Surgeries that should be provided within the public health care system are now being performed in private, for-profit clinics in Regina and Saskatoon. The government is re-directing funds that should be used to build capacity in our province’s hospitals to profit-driven centres, owned by a handful of private investors. (more…)
