Two Tier Alberta Redux

The Stelmach government made several announcements this week concerning seniors. All of them are about their plan to end universality and create a two tier system of seniors service.
Alberta seniors who can afford it to be able to buy extra care
Ironically one of those announcements backfired.
Seniors won't pay for braces, artificial limbs
seniors earning more than $21000 were going to be required to pay part of the cost of the devices that had been free.
And while the government quickly backtracked claiming that it was all a miscommunication, it wasn't. The government is giving with one hand and taking away with another.
Alberta opening doors to for-profit drug providers for seniors
As of January 2010, the Stelmach government will eliminate its universal Alberta Blue Cross benefit for the province’s elderly and replace it with a new income-based system that opens the door to “private, for-profit health insurance companies,” says Elisabeth Ballermann, president of the Health Sciences Association of Alberta (HSAA/NUPGE).
So despite the backpedaling on one miscommunication, the reality is that the government does not have a leg to stand on when it says it is improving seniors care in the province. It is introducing two tiered seniors care. And with that can two tiered health care be far behind?
David Eggen, executive director for Friends of Medicare, said the government's move to charge well-off seniors jeopardizes the universality of health care. "We're very concerned about all the Albertans targeted for increases," Eggen said. "Seniors should be upset after they have been paying into the system their entire lives and then the rules change."
And while the government is claiming wealthy seniors can pay for more care services the reality is that in B.C. such programs have hurt those who cannot afford it. B.C. like Alberta has promoted P3's.
PORT ALBERNI — On Wednesday of this week it was reported that the former residents of Cowichan Lodge are now paying more at the P-3 Sunridge Place. When the Government fired all the workers at Cowichan Lodge and forced the residents to leave a publicly funded facility and move into Sunridge Place, VIHA and the Government promised no extra fees and better service. The extra costs are reported by one patient to be approx $300 per month. This is how the private part of the partnership makes money. They have to charge for “extras” that used to be covered in the main costs at the publicly funded facility. The government may be still paying the same amount per patient, but the company can’t make a profit on that unless they slash wages, lower services and increase “user fees.” This equals less care and more costs for our retired elderly workers and their families. Is this what we want for our parents or ourselves? With many seniors’ loss of assets due to the market downturn these extra charges are even more mean spirited than usual.

See:
Two Tier Alberta
Medicare Calgary Style

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Nova Scota Imitates Alberta

Alberta has the most regressive labour laws in Canada. It long ago banned hospital workers, including nurses, right to strike. That of course did not stop those workers from going on strike. The right to strike is an essential workers right and is defended by the International Labour Organization as such. It is as essential as the right to unionize.

If governments banned the right to unionize it would be seen as the actions of an authoritarian state. The same goes for banning the right to strike. Ironically unions were banned in the 19th Century as 'criminal conspiracies' to limit trade. It was several years after Canada became a nation that Britain changed its laws and Canada followed suit. That did not stop workers from organizing unions, as secret societies; like the Knights of Labor. It meant workers on the job organized, and went on strike because that is their right as workers. All we have to sell is our labour or our time, our presence on the job.

In Alberta hospital workers were declared an essential service that still did not prevent AUPE or the Nurses union from going out on 'illegal' strikes. And win wage and benefit gains.

In Nova Scotia the hospital employers are running TV ads, I have satellite so I get to see them when I watch the CFL or NHL on CBC Halifax, claiming it hurt patients and is in everyones 'best' interest to end the right to strike. They claim other provinces do it and it has brought labour peace. Actually they meant to say appeasement. However that being said these employers are just another arm of government. They are government appointees or hirelings. So while one arm of the government, the legislature, brings in anti-worker anti-union anti-strike laws the other arm of the government, its employer association running the public hospitals, does the PR for the law.

The fact is that if the employer, who is the government, would fund hospitals and medical services properly then workers would be assured of proper wage and benefit increases, and proper hours of work. Instead the employer, which is the government, wants to cut wages, benefits and contract out work, split shifts, end seniority etc. etc.

A group that does not face these draconian attacks is of course the Doctors who are a business monopoly. There are few doctors strikes in Canada, and if they do occur they are short lived because governments assure doctors their services are paid for. Then they turn around and cut services in hospitals and cut other workers wages and benefits and tell them to hold the line.

The reality is that mediation only works between equals. In this case the government and its hospital administration view doctors as indispensable, and other workers as dispensable. If they didn't they would fund hospitals fully so all workers got the pay, benefits and hours of work they deserve. If that was the case there would be no need to strike.

Mediation does not work. Nor does denying workers the right to strike. They will, as history has shown, strike when they get cheated and screwed whether it is against the law or not.

What is interesting is that this balanced and pro-union article is from a Business Journal.

Union Dues: Anti-strike bill 'political posturing'
BY BRIAN FLINN, TRANSCONTINENTAL MEDIA
The Nova Scotia Business Journal

Health workers, the NDP and the Liberals are lined up against the government's highest-profile bill as the Nova Scotia legislature ends a seven-month summer break. Premier Rodney MacDonald said he's pushing ahead with the doomed anti-strike legislation because Nova Scotians deserve to hear it debated and find out how their MLAs vote. But he's not putting his minority government's survival on the line.

"There won't be any confidence votes this fall," MacDonald told reporters.

The government has been working on a bill to replace health strikes with arbitration since a brief IWK walkout earlier this year. Health- and community-care workers don't want to lose collective bargaining rights, and plan to rally outside Province House today while Lt.-Gov. Mayann Francis reads the speech from the throne.

"We're pleased the opposition will defeat this bill," said Joan Jessome, president of the Nova Scotia Government and General Employees Union. "But it can come back again and again. We need to make our point strong and clear enough to put this to rest."

The premier said he does plan to revive the bill later. "I'm a patient person," he said.

Both the Liberals and the NDP plan to defeat the bill at the first opportunity, when it goes to a second reading vote. MacDonald said the Liberals are "stuck in the past," while the NDP is standing up for special interests.

"They receive a lot of funding from the unions. They generally tend to be the biggest contributor to the NDP and most of their candidates," he said. "It's unfortunate; you don't put that ahead of health and safety."

NDP Leader Darrell Dexter said MacDonald is trying to distract attention from bigger problems in health care, such as emergency-room closings and the shortage of nursing-home beds. He said it's unfortunate the government is wasting some of the few days it allows the legislature to sit, on a doomed bill. "This bill is purely a product of political posturing," Dexter said.

Liberal Leader Stephen McNeil said he doesn't hear Nova Scotians pleading for anti-strike legislation. He said his party wants to co-operate with health workers, not take away their rights. "Where's the crisis?" McNeil asked. "I have yet to understand why the premier and the government are hanging their hats on this issue."

The House has to sit for only two days to avoid the label of the laziest legislature in Canada for a fourth year in a row. Prince Edward Island's House sat just 24 days this year, one more than Nova Scotia. – The Daily News

EXTRA: Strike threats useful warning system
By Brian Flinn, Transcontinental Media

Taking the right to strike away from health workers would damage an important safety mechanism and jeopardize the care of Nova Scotians, according to a new study by the Centre for Policy Alternatives.

Saint Mary's University professors Judy and Larry Haiven wrote that health workers know when the system is being pushed beyond tolerable limits and can signal it by threatening to strike. They said it's similar to the "red cord" used to stop assembly lines when something goes wrong in a factory.

"Health-care workers must have a way of indicating that the conditions under which they work do not overstress them or the quality of health-care delivery," the Haivens wrote. "Thus, in the health-care system, the red cord can be said to be the power of health-care workers to threaten to, and if necessary, withhold their labour."

Labour Minister Mark Parent has argued a modern health-care system cannot tolerate work stoppages. The report says "management by stress" now predominates in health care, and an outlet is more important than ever. "If politicians and health-care administrators insist on running a system so close to the bone, then the ability of workers to strike, to pull the red cord, as it were, is an essential system mechanism to ensure patient safety in the long run." – The Daily News

And this is from the Dominion Blog

November 23, 2007

NS Government Faces Heat Over Anti-Strike Bill

In one of the more polite demonstrations I've attended, a union coalition lead by the Nova Scotia General Employees Union staged a sidewalk rally of about 500 in front of the province's legislature on Thursday. While members of the crowd, which included a strong contingent of nurses and healthcare workers, heckled Premier Rodney Macdonald's minority government (top pic), the military guard-laden arrival of Nova Scotia's Lt.-Gov Mayann Francis, due to read her first speech from the throne, on the other side of the building was met with no interruption (bottom pic). After Macdonald's assertion that the unions were being "disrespectful" for holding a demonstration during the ceremonial speech from the throne, the union leadership responded by urging demonstrators to remain quiet outside of the legislature while Francis made her speech.

The rally was called in response to a bill due to be introduced by the minority tories banning the right to strike for the 32,000 healthcare workers in Nova Scotia. Macdonald had promised to introduce the bill in May following a one-day strike at a children's hospital in Halifax. The bill seems to be on the verge of being junked as a result of the union campaign, as both the Liberals and NDP have pledged to vote against it, were it to be introduced by the minority government. As a result, Macdonald has admitted he is unwilling to see his government fall as a result of the proposed anti-strike legislation.

Regardless of this apparent defeat, the throne speech outlined the Tory government's plans to establish more publicly funded, private health facilities in the province.

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Still Waiting and waiting and.....

For all their talk about how the Harper government takes action it is just that talk.

Jim Flaherty's timelines on national securities regulator, international tax

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has repeatedly talked about plans to strike two panels: One to create draft legislation for a national securities regulator, and the other to identify ways to improve the fairness and competitiveness of Canada’s system of international taxation.

The latter panel was even suppose to produce an interim report by the end of 2007 and a final report in 2008. But the panels don’t exist yet. When will they be created?

“Soon,” Mr. Flaherty told reporters after speaking at a Rotary Club of Toronto event. Asked to clarify how soon, he said the international tax panel will show up within the next ten days. He did not elaborate on the national securities regulator panel.

Canada's health care rated poorly

Canada has the worst rating in a new study of health care in seven countries when it comes to wait times for seeing doctors and getting elective surgery.

And the Commonwealth Fund says Canadians are most likely to report going to an emergency room as an alternative to a visit to a doctor's office or clinic.

Only 22 per cent of Canadians surveyed say they could get a same-day appointment when they're sick. Thirty per cent -- by far the highest among the countries -- say they had to wait six days or more.

And 15 per cent reported waits of six months or more for non-emergency surgery.

Meantime, two-thirds reported having a lot of difficulty getting care at night, on weekends or holidays.

"The report indicates that Canadians are saying the same thing to politicians that they're saying to the Commonwealth Fund: access to physicians and access to medical services has to improve," said Health Minister Tony Clement.

"We share that concern."

SEE

Finally Some Common Sense

Still Waiting On Wait Time 2

Still Waiting On Wait Time 1

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Another Capitalist Myth

Another myth about competition lowering costs to consumers bites the dust. Give business a break and they will take it, while still screwing you and me.

And while our prices are cheaper than in the U.S. you and I are in effect subsidizing generic drug manufacturers in Canada.

Oh yes and don't forget that the largest increase in health care costs is drugs.

The benefits of strong competition in Canada's generic drug sector are not finding their way into consumers' pocketbooks, Canada's Competition Bureau said in a report released on Monday.

The report found that one of the reasons generic drugs are more expensive in Canada than other countries is the existence of a rebate system that discourages pharmacies from passing along savings to customers.

In most of Canada's provinces, drug manufacturers compete with each other by offering pharmacies rebates of an average 40 percent off the invoice price as an incentive for the retailers to choose their products, the bureau said.

But the rebates are typically not reflected in the prices that consumers pay for drugs.

"They're giving (pharmacies) a break," Commissioner of Competition Sheridan Scott said in response to reporters' questions at a press conference. "That's a normal thing. The question is, why is the money staying at the pharmacy level."

The study found that the rebate system gives manufacturers little incentive to compete through lower prices.

And these are the same guys who whine about unfair competition from the Big Pharma establishment. They are as much a part of Big Pharma as the established drug companies. Horse of a different colour.

SEE:

Merck Tax Rip Off

Big Pharma Rip Off

The Mulroney Legacy

Profits Up Jobs Cut

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Put Doc's On Salary

It's time to proletarianize these petit-bourgeoisie self employed businessmen, and put them on salaries in community based medical clinics. Which would include pharmacists, and other complimentary workers like nurse practitioners.

This is not as far fetched as it may seem. Without such a radical grassroots reform expect the CMA businessmen to continue to lobby for contracting out and user fees as their ideals of Medicare reform.

Medical user-fee motion vote narrowly fails

doctors narrowly defeated a controversial user-fee motion at the annual Canadian Medical Association meeting.

The motion, which proposed that patients should help fund their care with "co-payments and health savings accounts," drew support from 48 per cent of voting doctors. Fifty per cent were opposed and two per cent abstained.

"Co-payments" mean patients would pay a fee when they see their doctors or obtain hospital services. "Health savings accounts" would act like registered retirement savings plans, enabling people to stash savings in tax-sheltered accounts, to be spent on medical items like home care, long-term care and prescription drugs.

CMA president wants public and private health care

"My support for universal health care is unequivocal, but I believe the [Canada Health] Act must be revised, reformed and updated," said Day, a founder and owner of the private Cambie Surgery Centre in Vancouver.

He said there could be a role for private health care in our public system.

"I realize it will surprise some of you that I raise this topic," he said. "Let's be clear. Canadians should have the right to private medical insurance when timely access is not available in the public system.

"Contracting out public health services to the private sector to reduce wait lists is not a new idea and does not spell the end of universality."

Prescribing a health-care revolution

The entire health-care system has to be examined with two aims in mind: To offer excellent health care as it is provided now, but using different professionals at a much lower cost.

Let's start with the drug companies. They spend tens of millions on research and promotion and bring out new drugs at an inflated price that are only marginally, if at all, better than the drugs being used. It is estimated that only about one in 20 drugs released for use is of major importance. The government should appoint pharmacists to check these new drugs against what is in use for a particular patient to see if the higher price is reflected in a healthier patient.

All the work done by doctors, dentists, pharmacists, nurses and optometrists must be examined to see if their jobs can be inter-changed at a lower cost. As an example, the Ontario government will soon license dental hygienists to practise independent of dentists. This could change the way basic preventive oral care is offered in Ontario, surely at a lower cost.

In the North, where doctors are scarce, nurse-practitioners do the job of the GPs very successfully.

SEE:

Laundry Workers Fight Privatization

Two Tier Alberta

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Universal Health Care and Charter Schools

The right wing loved Wisconsin when it adopted their Charter School program, despite it's failure, to create a market place in public education or improve test scores.

Now that Wisconsin wants to try socialized medicine ala Canada, well the wailing, wrenching and rendering of political breasts on the right begins.

Let Wisconsin Experiment with Socialized Medicine

John Stossel says " go for it, Wisconsin ". His theory is that perhaps their experience will finally demonstrate for all that the "socialist approach" isn't the way to go. Of course, as you might imagine, "free" health care isn't free: The plan would cost an estimated $15.2 billion, or $3 billion more than the state currently collects in all income, sales and corporate income taxes.

Hopefully the empirical research that results from Wisconsin's experiment with Medicare, will be better than has been done with "For Profit Education" and Charter Schools.



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Ex Pat Attacks Medicare

In their summer issue of City Magazine; American Nativist Right Wing Think Tank; The Manhattan Institute has published an attack on Canadian Medicare,in response to Michael Moores Sicko. And they have an ex Canadian write it for them.

The Ugly Truth About Canadian Health Care
David Gratzer

Socialized medicine has meant rationed care and lack of innovation. Small wonder Canadians are looking to the market.

Once again the American Right carts out the slander of long waiting lines in Canada, confusing as they do 'wait times' for waiting lines, conjuring up as they do images of lines of folks in the Soviet Union waiting for weekly rations of meat and bread.

And while giving examples of the right wing attempt to privatize health care in Canada, the writer misses the underlying point. While Canadians may accept a certain level of privatized services, for delivery of Workers Compensation for instance, they rely upon socialized medicine for the majority of their health care and they like it. Which of course just goes to prove we are socialists.

He is not the only ex-pat shilling for the right wing anti-Medicare lobby in the U.S.

Of course the ideal of a universal health care system that then allows for alternative delivery of some treatments, those too expensive, or experimental, or those needed for workplace injuries, is the basis of health care in Canada and Britain not for some citizens but for all, and finds a supporter in the very voice of Adam Smiths Capitalism; The Economist.

Nobody denies that the insecurity in America has been sharpened by the absence of a comprehensive health-care system. Most Americans still get their health care from their companies: lose your job, and you lose your insurance cover with it. All the main Democrats, but none of the leading Republicans, have promised to provide universal, affordable health care. Interestingly, even the most radical of the Democrats' health plans, that of Mr Edwards (see article), is hardly extremist stuff, relying on the private sector but tweaking the system to make sure that no one falls through the cracks and that costs are controlled.

“WE'RE right at the cusp of an ideological truce on health care,” declares a beaming Ron Wyden. The Democratic senator has reason to be pleased. A version of his Healthy Americans Act, an ambitious health-reform bill aimed at universal coverage that he has already introduced into the Senate, was due to go to the House this week. At that point, his bill will become the first bipartisan, bicameral congressional effort in over a decade to tackle the issue of extending health care to the country's growing legion of uninsured.

Today, though, Americans are increasingly unhappy with the health system. Congressman Brian Baird, a co-sponsor of the House version of the universal-care bill, argues that many millions have lost their employer-provided insurance since the failure of the Clinton plan and even more fear they might. Such widespread insecurity has breathed new life into reform.

That appeals to businesses, which, like individuals, are feeling increasingly insecure as the cost of employee health benefits continues to soar well above the rate of inflation. Wal-Mart, America's biggest retailer, has been loudly pushing for universal coverage, and the current bipartisan efforts in Congress have won praise from General Mills, a big cereal manufacturer, Aetna, an insurance giant, and other firms.

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Legacy Of The Ralph Revolution

All those gold stars and awards the Fraser Institute gave Ralph Klein for his neo-con revolution in the nineties are revealed to be bronze.

Ten years after his cuts to health care and public sector workers the chickens have come home to roost.

A scandal has erupted in Alberta CEO' Ed Stelmachs backyard. The Hospital Authority and the local hospital in his hometown of Vegreville have not had adequate sterilization procedures in place since 2003. For four years it had been ignored until this spring when scandal broke.

The government has fired its appointed health board, claiming that the Premier and his Ministers did not know of the crisis in his backyard.

Premier Ed Stelmach and Health Minister Dave Hancock both suggested yesterday the government couldn't have done more to prevent a four-year outbreak of infectious disease at St. Joseph's Hospital in Vegreville because they weren't aware it was going on.

He is of course fibbing.

But area resident Connie Marcinkoski doesn't buy the province's promise to swoop in and save the day.

Marcinkoski is currently suing the hospital for allegedly exposing her father to a fatal infection a few years ago.

"The province, in fact Premier Ed Stelmach himself as our MLA, knew about the ongoing issues here years ago. I called him personally when he was our MLA to alert him to this issue and he never called me back," she said.

"The Conservative government has known about this problem for years and now wants to come in and look like they are everybody's saviour.

The government has brought in an old buddy who promotes the privatization of health care to oversee the board and hospital.

Effective immediately, Jim Saunders, of J.L. Saunders and Associates Inc., and Paddy Meade, deputy health minister, will serve as official administrators for East Central Health, replacing the board.

It has talked about hiring risk managers to assess how to avoid this kind of thing in the future.

The region is also looking to hire more staff in risk management.

What it failed to do was hire more cleaning staff, those folks who were either laid off or contracted out during the Ralph Revolution.

A scathing report issued this week found that the hospital and health board practices were a result of the 'culture of fugality', that is as Ralphs appointed buddies they knew that they had to keep costs down, which meant contracting out laundry services and cutting back house keeping services while paying big bucks to a top heavy administration. Now they want to bring in more management to resolve the crisis when what they need is more hospital cleaners.

In a “culture of frugality” the facility did not even have the proper equipment to sterilize laboratory gear, and ignored requests from the authority because of a turf war caused by fuzzy provincial legislation.

It also says the testing procedure for those potentially infected has been slowed by a lack of provincial support.

The sterilization area of the hospital was actually a converted portion of the laundry room. It wasn’t isolated from other areas. Basic procedures for sterilizing equipment were ignored as well, including using properly sterilized water instead of attempting to sterilize hospital tap water. The authority, meanwhile, did not follow up to ensure its requests were followed.

The Stelmach governments response has been more of the same. Which will not solve the problem.

In an era when hand-sanitizing stations can be found metres apart in places like the Capital Ex fair grounds, it is appalling to learn that the healthcare facilities that people in east-central Alberta count on have ignored or neglected even the most basic hygiene measures because of turf wars, confusion or because administrators were just too cheap.

Despite an outbreak of wildly contagious Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) at St. Joseph's that lasted years, neither hospital officials nor the provincially appointed health board took the crucial steps to bring the situation under control.

The public only learned about the problems in St. Joseph's and East Central Health when the region's Medical Officer of Health ordered the hospital closed to new admissions in March due to concern about the facility's central sterilization room and bits of flesh on hospital tools.

One of the key problems the Health Quality Council identified in its investigation is the fact that the province's varying pieces of health legislation have set up a system of rival bosses. That same conflict potentially exists throughout the province.

Despite the chilling report on East Central Health, Hancock rejected the notion this his government bears any responsibility for the problem. "This is not an issue that can be thrown back on the budget process," he said.

Hancock is ignoring the fact that when the Tory government he now represents first introduced its draconian cuts to health-care funding and decentralized the province's medical system to a series of regional boards, there were public demonstrations against the moves. Anyone with concerns was ignored by the then premier and his cabinet or portrayed as a Liberal crank.

The people overseeing the health authorities also were in a bind. If they didn't play ball, they were either turfed from their jobs or the region was simply disbanded. When budgets are everything, how can anyone be confident that a rigid budget allows administrators to spend extra for the best cleaning fluid or to buy the appropriate sterilization equipment when faced with a huge list of competing needs?

Vegreville's problems likely widespread: doctor

'These things happen everywhere'

Frank noted cardboard boxes were found in sterilization rooms in Tofield, Lamont, Two Hills and other health centres, creating concern for the buildup of fungus. Staff at St. Mary's hospital in Camrose wore jewelry while sterilizing. Frank said the cardboard could have been taken out and the jewelry removed in one day to prevent closure of the units.

But other problems were clearly more major, Frank said. Tables in the Lamont hospital's operating room weren't wiped down between patients, the report found. The sterilization room at Viking's hospital had holes in the wall and ceiling that hadn't been fixed in several years. In Provost, nail care supplies from community health clinics weren't being sterilized, only cleaned.

No sterilization records were being kept in Killam, and a January audit revealed that single-use cautery devices were being re-used after wiping the tip, even though they were meant to be disposed of after one use.

Frank, who doesn't work at these other centres, acknowledged such safety gaps may suggest a lack of a safety culture, which the report pointed out.

But he said, "I don't think there has ever been a don't-care attitude (among health care workers)."

He said such problems are likely happening across Alberta, especially since many centres are struggling with short staffing like St. Joseph's.

Self-evaluation of sterilization practices -- done by all Alberta health regions earlier this year after the health minister ordered them to -- isn't enough, he said. Government inspections and document reviews will also be needed.

Sterilization and cleanliness problems aren't limited to hospitals in Vegreville and the East Central Health Region, says the president of the union representing surgical processors.

Doug Knight, Alberta Union of Provincial Employees president, said a "culture of cutbacks" in the provincial government and health regions dating back to the mid-1990s has led to unfilled vacancies in surgical processing and cleaning departments across Alberta.

He has heard cases of Calgary licensed practical nurses getting their scrubs back from the washers with mop strings in the pockets.

"That means they're washing their scrubs with the mops," he told Sun Media.

Knight disapproves of hospitals sending their linens out to private cleaners where the hospital has little control of the cleaning process. He suggests immediately returning privatized cleaning and laundry services to the control of health regions.

Ed Stelmach--in good times and bad - has certainly been the recipient of Ralph Klein's legacy.

In the case of the staphylococcus infection at St. Joseph's General Hospital in Vegreville, the premier clearly got the dirty end of the stick.

Health Quality Council CEO Dr. John Cowell's damning report into the incident revealed that anomalies began showing up in East Central Health authority stats as early as 2003.

By the time Cowell's team finished their investigation, they found serious breaches of sterilization standards throughout the region.

The problem was so extensive that Alberta Health Minister Dave Hancock placed the region under direct government administration and fired the board.

But somewhere along the way, a fundamental aspect of the system - proper sanitation - has been allowed to slide.

This was clearly the case in the East Central Health region.

It also puts a spotlight on the role and responsibilities of health boards, which were partially elected at one time.

They have now deteriorated into Buddy Boards that are liberally stocked with friends of the PC Party as a reward for loyal service and dedication to the cause.

As part of his mandate from Stelmach, Hancock is now charged with reviewing the governance of health boards.

But even before it began, he ruled out a return to elected health boards.

Opposition parties say Premier Ed Stelmach must should some of the blame for the hospital sterilization scandal that has rocked Alberta's health care system and forced three-thousand former patients to be tested for HIV and hepatitis.

Liberal health critic Laurie Blakeman says it's ironic that the same Tory politicians who helped created this sterilization crisis now want people to believe they're in the best position to fix the problems.

NDP Leader Brian Mason said Stelmach must shoulder some of the blame for the "mess" that is now affecting thousands of Albertans.

"This is a legacy of neglect that has affected the health of Albertans and Premier Stelmach bears significant responsibility," said Mason.

The auditor general pointed out three years ago that the committee that checks Alberta hospitals is unqualified, yet the premier has done nothing to change this, said Mason.

The premier also confirmed Thursday that the government is reviewing a master agreement for Alberta's so-called faith-based hospitals.

The controversial deal more than a decade ago kept boards in place at hospitals with religious ties at a time when other hospital boards were being dismantled as the province created health regions with new boards that would run all health facilities in the region.

The facility is run by volunteers and is known as a faith-based hospital. It works under a separate master agreement with the province. The East Central Health Region, however, also has responsibility under different legislation to run the hospital.

That was the wellspring of the problem, said Dr. John Cowell of the Health Quality Council.

He told a news conference in Calgary there there was acrimony and bureacuratic turf wars between the hospital board and the health region board. The health region didn't feel like it could step in unless asked and the hospital treated orders from the region as requests that could be acted on or ignored.

"There was a problem of two bosses and no bosses," said Cowell.

"At certain levels of both organizations there seemed to be much more focus on turf and not a focus on patient safety."

That problem flowed to people on the front line, he said. Nobody knew whom to report to, problems weren't getting solved, doctors declined to step in, morale dropped and health and safety practices spiralled out of control.

Then Cowell took aim at the board which he said had a "dysfunctional" relationship with the hospital, and did not show a "clear understanding of the seriousness of the MSRA situation and did not take action to improve the situation."

For that and much more, they are gone. But how they got there in the first place, Cowell chose to pin the tail on the political donkey.

"In terms of how these individuals are discovered and chosen and appointed," Cowell winked, "I think that's a question you should place right to the minister."

So I did.

Hancock quickly confessed that since these folks get their jobs from the government "these are political appointees."

They weren't always appointed, of course. For a brief moment in Tory time, a portion of health boards were elected.

That means you can de-elect them if they step out of line, unlike Hancock's Buddy Boards.

Part of Hancock's damage control is to develop a "culture of excellence." Including something he calls a "governance review and accountability framework."

You mean like elected health boards?

That's where Hancock started getting nervous and making Freudian slips like calling health care "haircut."

"No," the health minister blurted. "I don't foresee that."

"I'm elected and my colleagues in the legislature are elected to help set health policy for the province."

If they got their jobs in a vote, those regional health boarders would almost certainly go wild. Just like elected school board trustees do. Except they don't.

"I don't believe there has been pork barrelling of the health authorities," Hancock insisted, even though as the Minister Responsible for Edmonton, Hancock is the Grand Poopah of Pork for the Capital Region.

"In making appointments, we've always had to make sure we appoint good people," he said.

And now he's had to fire "good" people too.

Hancock calls the sideshow "irreparable and untenable" and boots the provincially appointed board. He is also expected to can a couple suits with the health region.He says he will put in provincial standards for infection prevention and control and he says he will make sure health regions know they are the boss. He also doesn't feel the health region board is clueless because they are Tory appointees.

"I don't believe there has been pork barrelling," insists the health minister. Couldn't that be cleared up if the health boards were elected as they were supposed to be?

SEE:

Tories Health Plan Kills Albertan

Laundry Workers Fight Privatization

Feminizing the Proletariat

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Privatizing Healthcare

The Law is an ass. In this case the flaws of Canada's Health Accord act are used to get around the principle and spirit of the law. In fact while saying they are not costing the public system a loss of doctors, they are in fact doing just that. But not from B.C.'s jurisdiction, but from the public health care systems in Alberta and Manitoba, where doctors are just as scarce. Which shows why a decentralized provincial system which allows competition for the same human resources is joke when if comes to equalization of services in a federalist state.

Private BC clinic to reopen

The False Creek Urgent Care Centre, which was criticized by some as a direct assault on Canada's public health-care system, agreed to stop admitting B.C. patients within days of its opening last December. Now, after obtaining legal advice and rounding up a roster of out-of-province doctors, the clinic is on stronger legal footing, Chris Freimond said.

And Health Minister George Abbott said this time it appears the private clinic is operating within the law.

The Canada Health Act and the province's Medicare Protection Act prohibit doctors or clinics from billing patients for medically necessary services that are covered by publicly funded medicare.

To get around this legal barrier, Dr. Godley has recruited a team of emergency physicians from outside the province, Mr. Freimond said.

Mr. Abbott said if the clinic hires doctors from outside the B.C. Medical Services Plan, then no laws are being broached.

Mr. Abbott said he was told the clinic has hired two doctors from Alberta and one from Manitoba.

By bringing doctors from out of province, Dr. Godley said the clinic will not be raiding the public system. He added that the clinic will relieve pressure on hospital emergency rooms and help reduce waiting times.

See:

Medicare

Healthcare


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Tories Health Plan Kills Albertan

Yes you read that headline right. The hospital in Vegreville, under an appointed board, ruled over by another appointed board, and all those appointments are by the government, has an outbreak of super bug. And it resulted in one death at least.

Alberta hospital superbug scandal raises fears of Walkerton claim of 1 Death.

Because they failed to follow government health procedures and because they lack proper staffing, and have since the cutbacks under King Ralph. But the Premier and government steps in and assigns the review to another government appointed board, rejecting any independent review. Stelmach rejects calls for public inquiry

Only in Alberta. Home of the right wingers who bitch about federal accountability while at home they give it the old boot up the bum while covering their asses.


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Medicare

Healthcare


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Mike Lake No Kilgour

Mike Lake the Conservative MP who took over David Kilgour's Edmonton Beaumont riding shows he is no Kilgour.

Mike Lake, the Conservative MP and father of an autistic child, who opposed the Shawn Murphy attempt to ensure autism coverage in the Canada Health Act, has not offered any public comment on the failure to provide a single penny for autism in his party's budget. Emails sent to his office are responded to by a staffer who informs that Mr. Lake has received too many emails on the subject of autism to respond personally.

Obviously Mike Lake has less pull in caucus than Jim Flaherty who has a disabled child and got money in the budget for families with disabled children. Or perhaps Mike is embarrassed; Genetic link to autism identified


See:

Disassociative Humour

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Still Waiting On Wait Times 2

Wait Times reduction is a major priority for the Harper government, right?

Wrong! Gatineau women wait up to 5 months for breast cancer test

And Gatineau is in the governments backyard.

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Still Waiting On Wait Times 1

Medicare

Healthcare


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Still Waiting On Wait Times 1

The most important priority of the Harpocrite government was wait times, and well we are still waiting to see what will be done to reduce them.

So far the New Government gets a big F for failure from those in the know.

A survey of Canadian doctors has given the battle to reduce health-care waiting times a marginal or failing grade. The combined efforts of governments to address wait times in targeted areas earned a D (poor) or F (very poor) grade from 57 per cent of respondents. Only 13 per cent felt the effort was producing excellent (A) or good (B) results.

And the result of the Tories jigging wait times is this;

Patient's choice: Wait 14 weeks or pay $5000

"In other words, the priority in some areas is causing ... less priority in other areas," says association president Dr. Colin McMillan.

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Medicare

Healthcare


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