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Showing posts from January, 2011

Letter of the week: Where are our frail seniors to live?

ALC issue a crisis to patients, relatives The Sudbury Star Wed Jan 19 2011,Page: A11   Column: Letters to the Editor Re: "ALC a challenge, not crisis" -- Dec. 20. I find it farcical that Denis Roy, the CEO of Sudbury Regional Hospital, says the alternate-level of-care issue is "not a crisis, but a challenge." Anyone who is an advocate for an elderly parent now in the system knows the whole situation is indeed a "crisis" if you're in the midst of living it alongside your parent. It certainly must be a challenging task to address as a health-care administrator, but anyone who is currently advocating for an elderly parent knows, it truly is a crisis. How else do you explain a marked lack of long-term care beds for the very people who built this community into what it is today? They have paid taxes for more than 50 or 60 years and now have to worry continually about where they will live and who will care for them, even as they are facing serious

Different gender, same hospital room

Ontario media are picking up on the placement of men and women in the same hospital room. "Gender cohorting has become more frequent in the whole province," said Katherine Stansfield, Quite Health Care's vice-president of patient services. "It's not a policy but certainly it has been the practice in the province for some time." She said patients of different genders are placed in the same rooms as needed. "It's not something that is part of regular practice but ... it is a very regular occurrence," said Stansfield. "If there is some concerns we make every effort to move the patient ... as soon as possible." High bed occupancy continues, but with some new twists... dallan@cupe.ca

Counting the cuts -- Peterborough gets on it

Most citizens of Peterborough and the surrounding area have been concerned for some time that huge staffing cuts at the hospital will erode patient care. Peterborough Health Coalition (PHC) has now opened a secure mailbox in the lobby of City Hall to collect confidential, accurate examples of declining care.  The Coalition plans to build a case for improvement. This mail box service was apporved by City Council last August. The collection of information will be the sole responsibility of PHC, and not of the City, and will be kept confidential until the authors specifically agree to release the examples for use by PHC on their behalf. The Coalition hopes that the documentation of declining care will help them build their case for adequate staffing at the local hospital. The  media will be kept informed. Roy Brady, Chairperson, Peterborough Health Coalition can be contacted at 705-745-2446.  A editorial dealing with this initiative by the Peterborough examiner is here .  Kudos to t

Retirement homes: What will it mean if more hosptial patients end up in them?

A Toronto Star story last month provides some useful information on for-profit retirement homes. These homes now take care of patients that, until recent years, were taken care of in hospitals. With hospital cutbacks, more hospital patients will be forced into them.  Here is part of what the Star reported : • The Ontario coroner's office is investigating the suspicious deaths of three elderly residents of a controversial west Toronto retirement home. • The coroner's probe comes after a Star investigation detailed allegations that residents Edith Farrell, 80, and Danny Henderson, 74, died in hospital earlier this year after suffering severe malnutrition at In Touch Retirement Living.  After the story ran, the family of a third resident, 83-year-old Nellie Dineno, came forward with allegations that she, too, had serious health problems that went untreated before her death in late July. • Critics say the government will allow the privately operated retirement homes to accep

Ontario’s Fiscal Outlook Improves. And also the prospects for public services?

The provincial government weathered this recession better than the previous recession in 1990-91. At the earlier recession the deficit topped out in 1992-93 at 4.4% of the GDP (and 22.9% of government spending and 29.7% of government revenue). In contrast, the provincial deficit topped out in 2009-10 at 3.3% of the GDP (and 16.7% of government spending and 20.1% of revenue). It is perhaps also worth noting that Ontario debt interest payments have remained constant as a percentage of GDP since the early 1980s, and have declined as a percentage of revenue. Moreover, the Ontario government has consistently revised its deficit projections downwards since the fall 2009 statement. Indeed, the government has removed well over $5 billion from its estimate of the 2009-10 deficit. Deficits are falling at the federal level.  In the fall 2010 quarterly update, Finance Minister Flaherty said the country's books will continue to improve, with a small deficit of $1.7 billion now forecast by

Ontario Spending on Tax Cuts for Business

The 2010 Budget continues the government’s spending on corporate tax cuts, with a reduction in the rate from 14% to 12% this year and 10% next year. The Small Business tax is lowered to 4.5% and the Small Business surtax is eliminated. Here is the government’s comment on this in its media release 3 June 2010 : TAX CUTS FOR BUSINESS Starting July 1, 2010, the government will be providing tax cuts totalling more than $4.6 billion over three years for large and small businesses: • The general Corporate Income Tax (CIT) rate will be lowered from 14 per cent to 12 per cent and then to 10 per cent over three years; • The Corporate Income Tax rate on income from manufacturing and processing, mining, logging, farming and fishing will be lowered from 12 per cent to 10 per cent; • The small business Corporate Income Tax rate will be cut from 5.5 per cent to 4.5 per cent; • The small business deduction surtax of 4.25 per cent will be eliminated. • These tax cuts are in addition to the m

Ontario hospital are among the most efficient in the country

Health care in Ontario is efficient compared to other provinces, and efficient public hospitals are the main way this has been achieved. • Provincial government health care spending in 2010 is $173 per capita less than the other provinces • All of this (and more) is accounted for by spending less per capita than other provinces on hospitals. Ontario spends $262 less per capita than the other provinces. In total that is a saving of $3.5 billion for all of Ontario. • The gap between what Ontario spends and what other provinces spend has increased every year since 2005 when the difference was only $86 per capita. • In contrast with hospital funding, Ontario spends more per capita than any other province on physicians: $192 more per capita than the other provinces. The gap between what Ontario spends and what other provinces spend has grown since 2005 when it was only $126 more in Ontario. • Ontario also spends more per capita on drugs, even a little more than Quebec which is t

Tory leader focuses on public sector collective agreements

Ontario Conservative leader Tim Hudak told reporters Wednesday that he would make cuts in the public sector. Hudak highlighted three broad areas for cuts. He would cut the number of boards, agencies, and commissions, he would end subsidies to corporations, and he would restrain public sector union collective agreements.   The McGuinty government has already eliminated many agencies, boards and commissions (to little fanfare) so that promise may not amount to much.  As for corporate subsidies, those should naturally decline as the recession ends (corporate subsidies are often rushed out during a recession, to prop up a floundering business sector).  Moreover, Hudak's promise still leaves plenty of opportunity for more corporate tax cuts (which is really another form of public sector expense, and one that the McGunity government has used, at great cost to the public). That leaves restraints on public sector collective agreements.  What the Tory leader means, exactly, however, r

Ontario health care spending remains much less than other provinces

The government has for some time identified health care and education as priorities for the government, and the 2010 Budget again flagged that status. Accordingly, health care has seen significant funding increases. The provincial government increased health care spending 6% in the 2010-11 Budget.  The four year health spending increase since 2006-7 is 29.1% (from $35.7 billion to $46.1 billion). The government says it plans to increase health care funding an additional $1.9 billion or 4.12% in 2011-12.   A similar forecast in the previous Budget turned out to be low.  So this may also be low. Doctors have gotten a large chunk of the new health care funding. OHIP funding for doctors has increased from $8.6 billion in the 2006-7 Estimates to $11.9 billion in 2010-11, a 38.4% increase over four years. Despite recent increases in Ontario health care spending, Ontario still lags most other provinces. Ontario spends $173 less per capita than the other provinces. It would take $2.3 bil

Cornwall Community Hospital gets a million dollar top-up. More to come?

New funding totaling $985,700 will keep 20 beds open at the Cornwall hospital until the end of the fiscal year. This should keep the "transitional care" beds opened in August running until March 31.    "At which time there are other strategies in the works," hospital CEO Jeanette Despatie said . The 20 convalescent beds were created in August to help deal with hospital overcrowding in Cornwall. Just before Christmas, Liberal MPP Rick Bartolucci announced another $1.4 million for Sudbury health care-- another area with severe hospital overcrowding. In this case, the money is dedicated to home care services and  new LTC beds. This announcement follows local campaigns (by CUPE and others) to defend health services. New health care money is often announced just about now -- late in the fiscal year.    So there may be more to come in the weeks ahead.  dallan@cupe.ca

Superbug Fix: More Cleaning, Less PR

A commentary from yesterday's Nanaimo Daily News on superbug outbreaks at the local hospital: What VIHA  (the local health authority) had to learn was this: to put the proper resources into cleaning and infection control rather than public relations. What we know from the last outbreak was that poorly paid and poorly trained cleaning staff were not doing a good enough job. The Daily News revealed continued understaffing, low pay, and poor training of cleaning staff by the private contractor hired to replace government workers after Bill 29 was introduced in 2002. While that was bad enough, VIHA was trying to hide those facts and that these problems among cleaning staff led in part to the last C. diff. outbreak. Following C. Difficile and other hospital infection problems,  the Vancouver Island Health Authority (VIHA) ditched its five year contract with Compass for housekeeping services. Unfortunately, there are few signs that such lessons are being take seriously in Ontario

Would you like a fingernail with that soup?

A staff member at Peterborough Regional Health Centre found a fingernail in her soup at the hospital's cafeteria. The cafeteria has been taken over by the giant transnational corporation, Compass.  They claim the fingernail came in a package from a supplier (of course) . Compass is also trying to take over food services at Kingston General Hospital, likely shipping in food from the same facility as in Peterborough. Soup anyone? dallan@cupe.ca