{"id":28945,"date":"2023-06-08T14:57:14","date_gmt":"2023-06-08T18:57:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ontariohealthcoalition.ca\/?p=28945"},"modified":"2023-09-21T16:46:39","modified_gmt":"2023-09-21T20:46:39","slug":"niagara-health-care-in-a-real-crisis-coalition-chair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ontariohealthcoalition.ca\/index.php\/niagara-health-care-in-a-real-crisis-coalition-chair\/","title":{"rendered":"Niagara health care \u2018in a real crisis\u2019: coalition chair"},"content":{"rendered":"

(June 6, 2023)<\/p>\n

By: Richard Hutton, Fort Erie Post<\/p>\n

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Health-care advocates are calling for the province to step in and keep south Niagara\u2019s urgent care centres operating 24 hours a day.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Niagara Health announced last week<\/a>\u00a0that as of July 5, operating hours at urgent care centres in Fort Erie and Port Colborne would be cut back to 12 hours a day (10 a.m. to 10 p.m.) seven days a week.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Speaking at a news conference at Queen\u2019s Park designed to put pressure on the Ford government to properly fund health care, Sue Hotte, chair of the Niagara Health Coalition, said that staffing shortages are affecting all three Niagara Health hospital sites, and all are operating over capacity.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIn a nutshell, what we have in Niagara, Port Colborne and Fort Erie is a real crisis,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThe government has the solution. The solution is you have to fund the system,\u201d she said, adding that funding needs to build a better system for the future and not simply provide temporary relief.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThey need the funding that is guaranteed so that they can attract the physicians and the nurses and the technicians to come and stay in our hospitals, to stay there and work there,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Fort Erie resident Heather Kelly, a member of the group Fort Erie SOS, said having fully operational urgent care at Douglas Memorial Hospital was a matter of life and death for one American summer resident who suffered from heart issues.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only place she knew to go was Douglas Memorial and thank goodness this wasn’t July 5, the date of an announced closure,\u201d Kelly said. \u201cBecause they were able to take her in, even though she presented with no vital signs. They were able to take her and get her heart going again and then stabilize there so she could move on to a larger centre after that.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The cut to UCC hours is just the latest blow to health-care access in Fort Erie, she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cWe thought many years ago when they decided that they were going to close the hospital facility,\u201d Kelly said. \u201cWe were able to maintain a smaller, urgent care centre after that and now they’re saying that we need to also lose the urgent care.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Hotte and Kelly were joined at the event by Niagara\u2019s three NDP MPPs, Wayne Gates (Niagara Falls), Jeff Burch (Niagara Centre) and Jeannie Stevens (St. Catharines).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThis is an issue that was created by the Ford government,\u201d Gates said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Legislation such as Bill 124, which limits wage increases in the health-care sector to one per cent, \u201cattacked nurses\u201d and Bill 60, which will allow private clinics to perform some health-care services under OHIP, has contributed to staffing shortages across the province.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cWe\u2019re seeing it all across the province, you’re seeing in Fort Erie with the urgent care centre,\u201d he said. \u201cYou’re seeing it in Minden, that had their emergency rooms closed.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIf these urgent cares close, people in Fort Erie are going to die,\u201d Gates said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Burch, meanwhile, recalled when he ran federally for the NDP back in 2005, that the prospect of hospitals being closed in Fort Erie and Port Colborne loomed large back then.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cWe were called fearmongers \u2026 and, you know, it turned out to be true,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is a long-standing trend to remove services from our community. We’ve been fighting this for a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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He said changes being made at Niagara Health\u2019s Welland site that have resulted in surgeries no longer being performed on weekends only complicates matters more for people in Port Colborne especially.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIf they have an emergency now, they can’t go to the urgent care after hours and they may not get the help they need if they go to the Welland hospital either,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Click here for original article<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(June 6, 2023) By: Richard Hutton, Fort Erie Post Health-care advocates are calling for the province to step in and keep south Niagara\u2019s urgent care centres operating 24 hours a day. 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