(Feb. 19, 2022)<\/p>\n
By: Colleen Romaniuk, <\/span>The Star<\/span><\/p>\n The Sudbury Health Coalition announced on Friday that it is participating in a provincewide campaign to oppose the privatization of Ontario\u2019s health care system.<\/p>\n The coalition joined its Sault Ste. Marie and Algoma partners for a video conference on Friday to discuss the impacts of privatization on local health care services and their plan to organize an effective local response.<\/p>\n During the video conference, coalition representatives said the Ford government announced plans to bring \u201cprivate for-profit hospitals\u201d to Ontario in addition to handing 18,000 long-term care beds to for-profit companies in 30-year contracts.<\/p>\n They also accused the province of failing to reinstate comprehensive inspections, improving care levels, privatizing \u201cthe last remaining public parts of home care,\u201d and allowing private testing clinics to charge hundreds of dollars for COVID-19 tests.<\/p>\n Sudbury\u2019s health coalition said they\u2019d be participating in the campaign to advocate for urgently needed improvements in care under the province\u2019s public, non-profit health care system.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are warning about the plans that are to begin immediately after the provincial June election this year,\u201d said Dot Klein, the chair of the Sudbury Health Coalition.<\/p>\n \u201cThis will lead to severe cuts to our public health-care services. The Ontario Health Coalition (OHC) is launching a fight back in our regions to safeguard public health care services and to stop privatization and the health care cuts.\u201d<\/p>\n Natalie Mehra, the executive director of the OHC, said Thursday the Ontario government\u2019s plans have been \u201cmostly hidden\u201d due to the attention paid to the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n She accused Ontario\u2019s health minister of squeezing a \u201cbombshell\u201d announcement into a recent press conference about easing COVID-19 restrictions throughout the province.<\/p>\n \u201cThe health minister announced that she is going to allow private clinics \u2013 which are euphemistically called independent health facilities in Ontario \u2013 to operate private hospitals in this province,\u201d said Mehra.<\/p>\n Mehra then played a clip of the press conference where Elliot said, \u201cwe\u2019re opening up pediatric surgery and cancer screenings, making sure that we can let independent health facilities operate private hospitals.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cDid you catch that? I will play it one more time in case you missed it,\u201d said Mehra, who played the clip again.<\/p>\n \u201c(Elliot) goes on to name a litany of other public health measures. The issue is this. Private hospitals are banned in Ontario. They\u2019ve been banned essentially since OHIP came in 1972.\u201d<\/p>\n She added that the Private Hospitals Act was most recently amended in 1971.<\/p>\n \u201cAs of 1973, all future private hospitals have been banned in this province. The act only really does one thing. It bans private hospitals,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt grandfathered any existing ones at that time, and then stopped any new ones from being opened. We have a public, not-for-profit hospital system in this province. There are only three private hospitals left.\u201d<\/p>\n She said the grandfathered private hospitals are limited in what they do.<\/p>\n \u201cTwo of them do surgeries. One of them is the Shouldice Hospital, which does particularly hernia surgeries and only does healthy people \u2013 does not take anyone who is overweight, has diabetes, comorbidities or other complex conditions,\u201d said Mehra.<\/p>\n \u201cThe other is the Don Mills Surgical Centre, which does walk-in day surgeries in, again, very limited numbers. The other one is an addictions facility.\u201d<\/p>\n Mehra reiterated that Elliot announced she\u2019s going to allow private clinics in Ontario \u2013 of which \u201cover 97 per cent are for-profit, according to the provincial auditor\u201d \u2013 operate private hospitals.<\/p>\n For-profit hospitals, she added, take only the \u201clight, easy patients\u201d and profitable diagnostics and surgeries, don\u2019t have intensive care units (ICUs), don\u2019t run teaching hospitals, and they don\u2019t have to operate 24 hours a day.<\/p>\n \u201cIt would be a mortal blow to our health care system,\u201d said Mehra, adding that Ontario\u2019s health care system is currently facing the worst staffing shortages she\u2019s ever seen.<\/p>\n \u201cToday is the beginning of us really trying to lay bare for the public the increasingly worrisome plans of the Ford government in terms of privatizing vital health care services, which have been getting worse as the years have gone by.\u201d<\/p>\n Ontario has learned a lesson about for-profit care during the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of outcomes at private long-term care facilities, she said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe only need to think about the last two years in long-term care in which more than 4,000 residents died. The death rates at private facilities were five times those of the publicly owned long-term care homes,\u201d said Mehra.<\/p>\n \u201cThe chains with the worst records had nine deaths per every 100 residents and the municipal homes had 1.2 deaths per 100 residents.\u201d<\/p>\n Reporters asked whether it was possible that Ontario\u2019s health minister \u201csimply misspoke\u201d during the press conference as there has been no other indication that the province is considering the privatization of hospitals.<\/p>\n \u201cThose words are very specific words. The minister has been around a long time \u2013 she was the health critic for a number of years. She knows the legislation very well,\u201d said Mehra.<\/p>\n \u201cThose are very carefully selected words. The plan that she was announcing there was the opening of surgeries and diagnostics in public hospitals while also dealing with a very significant load of COVID-19 patients.\u201d<\/p>\n Mehra said she thinks the province wants to hand the surgeries over to independent health care facilities.<\/p>\n The OHC plans to make the privatization of health care an election issue and to hold an \u201cemergency summit\u201d in March to protest funding cuts.<\/p>\n Randy Robinson, the director of the Ontario office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Initiatives said that there has been no rationale put forward by the Ontario government for the move towards privatization.<\/p>\n