Wildcat strike at hospitals a sign of a broken health-care system
For immediate release | February 19, 2012
Last week’s short wildcat strike at Alberta hospitals is a sure sign that the province’s health-care system is broken, says Deron Bilous, NDP candidate for Beverly-Clareview.
“The fact that support staff at a dozen hospitals were so frustrated that they felt they had no choice but to take this drastic action says a lot about the state of health care in Alberta. It says that the Tories have mismanaged health care,” says Bilous.
“Taking control of health care away from communities hasn’t worked for Albertans. Long wait times for procedures, overcrowded emergency rooms, staff complaining of being threatened or bullied after speaking out – these are all the result of Tory mismanagement,” he says.
“There are two important issues here. One is that the province relies too heavily on revenue from oil and gas. When oil prices dip, the Tories cut spending, putting pressure on vital services including health care.
The second issue is that the Tories (and their cousins in the Wildrose Alliance) want to privatize more of the health-care system – and take advantage of the health-care delivery problems they created by pushing the private option as a solution,” he says.
“Albertans are tired of telling the Tories that they don’t want private health care. They don’t want a two-tier, American style system. They want public health care delivered in public facilities. They want that because they know public health care gives better results at lower costs,” says Bilous.
According to the Parkland Institute at the University of Alberta: “A wide range of international peer-reviewed research published in renowned medical journals like those of the Canadian and American Medical Associations demonstrate that for-profit health care is associated with lower quality of care and comes with additional risks for adverse health events.”
Bilous says: “Alberta’s NDP has been on the front lines fighting to defend and improve the province’s health-care system. As your MLA for Beverly-Clareview, I will keep up that fight,” says Bilous.