Roslin resident Cliff Maclean shares how he lost his wife Heather to ovarian cancer less than a month ago at the healthcare town hall meeting February 8, 2016. (Photo: Nicole Kleinsteuber / Quinte News)
Medical professionals and the public voiced their concerns on a broken Ontario healthcare system at a series of town hall meetings Monday.
Prince Edward Hastings MPP Todd Smith accompanied by his Progressive Conservative party’s health critic, MPP Jeff Yurek hosted two sessions one in Belleville and another in the County.
In the Friendly City, doctors, nurses and our TMH members told a room of about 50 how five years of budget cuts coupled with layers of bureaucracy is creating a tsunami of problems at Belleville General and Trenton Memorial hospitals.
Julie Bryson is a family doctor who also practices in-patient care at BGH. She said doctors are strained because they can’t recruit new physicians due to struggles stemming from a two year difficulty in securing a contract with the province.
Yurek said he doesn’t understand how the government plans to resettle the healthcare system without talking to doctors. He said the majority of health spending should go to front line workers but only 40 cents on every dollar does adding the rest is tied up in bureaucracy. Yurek pointed to the Local Health Integration Network’s plan to essentially swallow up Community Care Access Centres where they will cease to exist. The health critic said it looks as though the plan is to create 80 sub-LHINs – something he said his party will be keeping an eye on going forward.
