Skip to main content

Come together: OCHU / CUPE Locals protest in Peterborough. Jeff Leal must defend hospital

Lots of fun yesterday at the OCHU/CUPE rally in defense of the Peterborough Regional Health Centre (PRHC), with a major focus on local Liberal MPP Jeff Leal. The rally called on him to start to fight for the local hospital, rather than the cuts.

The so-called "Hospital Improvement Plan"  cuts 12 medical beds, along with 8 surgical beds, 4 critical care beds, and 4 beds for women and children.  The plan also envisages closing 32 beds at Christmas and March break, and closing 16 beds during 4 summer weeks.  Other cuts include: driving down the length of stay, reduced diagnostic testing, reduced CT scan staffing (despite already having CT wait times well over the provincial target), reductions in the neuro and breathing clinic, reductions in hospital cleaning staff, and reductions in dietary staff.

As well, in January, 24 medical beds were reduced to "sub-acute" beds.  Eight other sub-acute beds are being created. But as these sub-acute beds are the targets of cuts all across Ontario, their future is pretty dodgy.

The hospital will lose 182.3 "full time equivalent" positions (283 actual jobs), making this the biggest hospital cutback in the province for years.   

Among the speakers was Candace Rennick, who hails from Peterborough and who is secretary treasurer of CUPE Ontario. She told the protest about a loved one who was treated in a hallway of the Peterborough hospital for five days. And that was before the bed cuts. Her loved one was forced to carry out all the activities of living in a hallway for five days -- while sick.  Rennick angrily dismissed the idea of more bed cuts.

About 800 OCHU / CUPE members from all over southern Ontario and the near north joined the rally (and the BBQ that followed). Laurie Hatton, recording secretary of CUPE Local 1943 (at Peterborough Regional Health Centre) noted her “appreciation to all the locals that assisted and participated in this demonstration.” Laurie added, “For many of my members this was their first rally and what a great way to be introduced to the CUPE family.”
The picture above features Roy Brady and the Peterborough Health Coalition, which joined in and supported the rally.

PRHC spokesman Jonathan Bennett disputed that the plan is affecting quality of care. "We certainly don't believe so," he said, adding that "it's our responsibility to balance the books."


Another hospital rally in Toronto is planned soon. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Ford government fails to respond to 72% increase in COVID inpatient days, deepening the capacity crisis

COVID infections continue to drive up hospital costs and inpatient hospitalizations in Ontario. For the most recent fiscal year (April 1, 2022- March 31, 2023) hospital stays related to COVID cost $1.221 billion, according to new CIHI data.   This is about 4% of total hospital spending, creating a very significant new cost pressure beyond the usual pressures of population growth, aging, inflation, and rising utilization.   Costs for COVID related hospitalizations increased 22.2% in Ontario in 2022/23 from the previous fiscal year, rising from $999 million to $1.221 billion.  That rise is particularly notable as the OMICRON spike of late 2021 and early 2022 had passed by the the 2022/23 fiscal year.   The $222 million increase in COVID hospitalization costs came in the same year as the Ford government cut special COVID funding and, in fact, cut total hospital funding by $156 million.     In total, there were 60,653 COVID hospitalizations...

The hospital crisis: No capacity, no plan, no end

While Canada has achieved universal public healthcare coverage, that does not mean conservative forces have given up trying to erode that coverage and expand corporate care where it does not currently exist. The battle has become particularly intense in Ontario under the Ford Progressive Conservative government, which is implementing serious cuts to the level of care and moving to bring in for-profit mini-hospitals. Inadequate Staffing.   Less and less of hospital spending is on staff.   Employee compensation as a share of hospital expenditures has consistently shrunk in Ontario. This is not some immutable law of hospital development.  It is in stark contrast with the rest of Canada, where compensation has become a larger share and now accounts for 67.1%. Hospitals in provinces other than Ontario now have 18 percent more staff per capita than hospitals in Ontario. Overall, if Ontario had the same staffing capacity as the other provinces and territories, there would be another...

The long series of failures of private clinics in Ontario

For many years, OCHU/CUPE has been concerned the Ontario government would transfer public hospital surgeries, procedures and diagnostic tests to private clinics. CUPE began campaigning in earnest against this possibility in the spring of 2007 with a tour of the province by former British Health Secretary, Frank Dobson, who talked about the disastrous British experience with private surgical clinics. The door opened years ago with the introduction of fee-for-service hospital funding (sometimes called Quality Based Funding). Then in the fall of 2013 the government announced regulatory changes to facilitate this privatization. The government announced Request for Proposals for the summer of 2014 to expand the role of "Independent Health Facilities" (IHFs).  With mass campaigns to stop the private clinic expansion by the Ontario Health Coalition the process slowed.   But it seems the provincial Liberal government continues to push the idea.  Following a recent second...