Skip to main content

“I am a Canadian, free to speak without fear, free to worship in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to oppose what I believe wrong, or free to choose those who shall govern my country. This heritage of freedom I pledge to uphold for myself and all mankind.” ~~ John G. Diefenbaker

FORSETH: How does ‘closing inpatient services’, ‘reducing hours’, ‘closing’ health clinics, and ‘rescheduling’ surgeries possibly equate to strengthening patient care?

    


Healthcare in rural and small-town BC is coming apart at the seams, and the NDP government of Premier John Horgan, and in particular Health Minister Adrian Dix, are letting it happen.

We've become a third world country as we ration, reduce, and remove health services -- ESPECIALLY outside of the larger metro areas of our province.  Here’s a perfect example, given news from the Interior Health Authority just two days ago (January 18th):

Interior Health is announcing temporary service adjustments to strengthen patient care due to Omicron-related COVID-19 staffing challenges ...

The temporary service changes include:

  • Closing inpatient services in Clearwater, Invermere, and Lillooet to stabilize emergency departments in those communities;

  • Reducing overnight hours at the Ashcroft Community Health Centre and the Slocan Community Health Centre in New Denver to stabilize daytime services in those communities;

  • Closing the Barriere and District Health Centre to redeploy staff to nearby emergency departments;

  • Temporarily rescheduling all non-urgent surgeries; temporarily reducing services across IH to some outpatient services; some primary care services, adult day programs and some non-urgent home health services

I’m sure I’m not the only one questioning how this makes ANY sense at all.

How does ... ‘closing inpatient services’ ... ‘reducing hours’ ... ‘closing’ health clinics ... and ‘rescheduling’ surgeries possibly equate to strengthening patient care?

Not even notifying community leaders, of these drastic measures being taken, also seems to be A-Okay with senior management within the Interior Health Authority – Mayor Ward Stamer of Barriere however was not impressed.  One day after IHA quietly announced this news (January 19th), CBC Kelowna quoted him as saying the closure of his community’s health clinic was:

“Wrong” and “totally irresponsible”. He then went on to say he was completely taken by surprise, and had only found out through Kamloops North Thompson MLA Peter Milobar.

While the COVID-19 pandemic has certainly exacerbated the situation, hundreds of thousands of British Columbians were already unable to even find a doctor to serve them. Further hospitals, especially in rural, northern, and small-town BC were already facing shortages of doctors and nurse through-out the province – a situation which is now becoming a critical.

The bottom line is that BC’s provincial government has to stop putting band-aids on the situation and ensure that we are turning out enough doctors and nurses to meet our needs – and an immediate solution needs to be found to have foreign trained medical people licensed to practice here.

One thing though, which we need to stop doing, is robbing other provinces and regions of our country of their medical practitioners and thereby robbing others of the care they need.  The same goes to head-hunting other countries and robbing them of the same thing.

It's a disgusting and reprehensible action and it needs to stop – there is NO reason why we should not be able to meet our own needs to the brightest young people our province has to offer!

It’s long past time to seriously plan for our needs because as the old saying goes, “A goal without a plan, is just a wish”.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Budget 2027: After a Decade of Decline, NDP Budget Delivers an Assault on Seniors, Working Families, and Small Businesses

Peter Milobar, BC Conservative Finance Critic, condemned the NDP government’s latest budget as the result of a decade of decline that has left British Columbians broke, unsafe, and paying more for less.   “After ten years of NDP mismanagement, this budget is an assault on seniors, working families, and the small businesses that drive our economy,” said Milobar. “The NDP have turned their back on the people working hardest to make ends meet and the seniors who built this province.” Milobar pointed to a new $1.1 billion annual income tax increase and warned that the government is piling new costs onto households already struggling with affordability.   “This government keeps asking British Columbians for more, while delivering less,” Milobar said. “The question people are asking is simple: Where has all the money gone?” Milobar noted that BC has gone from a surplus in the first year of NDP government to a projected deficit of more than $13 billion this year, while prov...
Post a Comment
Read more

WARD STAMER -- Those are REAL forestry numbers, not just made-up numbers

The following is a condensed version of remarks Kamloops – North Thompson MLA Ward Stamer’s made, regarding Forestry, in the BC Legislature, on Tuesday afternoon (02/24/2026)   Let’s talk a little bit, when we talk about Budget 2026, about the forest industry, which is near and dear to my heart. Forestry remains one of British Columbia’s foundational industries. It’s a pillar that built this province. Entire communities depend upon it. Interior towns, northern communities, Vancouver Island regions, the Kootenays, the Lower Mainland, with manufacturing facilities in Surrey and Maple Ridge, just to name a few — everywhere in BC is touched by forestry. One word that was not mentioned in Budget 2026 was forestry. That’s a shame, an incredible shame. It wasn’t an oversight – it was intentional. This government has driven forestry into the ground .... INTO THE GROUND! We can talk a little bit about some of the initiatives that this government has brought forth, to try to resurrect ...
Post a Comment
Read more

FORSETH -- Before anyone gets excited about one poll showing a candidate with a 25 percent lead, and 44 percent support overall, let’s give it a few more weeks

Is this based in reality -- how accurate are the numbers? In the past couple of weeks a couple of candidates, for the leadership of the BC Conservative Party, have been presenting polling results that they lead the pack – one even going so far as to say they have a lock on 44% of those who will be voting, and a twenty-five percent lead over the individual ranked second. I am going to say that this one, from Kerry-Lynne Findlay, is highly suspect. First of all the company conducting the poll, ERG National Research, is not a Member of Industry Bodies (the Canadian Research Insights Council), meaning they do not adhere to established industry standards for research, such as transparency, privacy, and methodological rigor. AI Overview states that ... based on alerts from the Canadian Research Insights Council (CRIC) and reports, ERG National Research should be treated with extreme caution regarding its reliability, and legitimacy, in conducting political polling. Before I even read this in...
Post a Comment
Read more

Labels

Show more