Here’s Your Chance To Be Heard On Fair Access For All To Hospital Services – Ontario Health Coalition To Hold Hearing In Niagara

By Fiona McMurran

Thanks to the hard work of individual citizens and organizations, as well as some local politicians, Niagara’s fight for accessible hospital services for all residents in the region has been recognized all across the province.

And yet the McGuinty government still doesn’t seem to be listening. So the Ontario Health Coalition, a non-profit group that speaks for Ontario residents, is giving concerned Niagara residents another opportunity to have our voices heard.

You may recall that last spring David Caplan, then-Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, responded to growing anger expressed by citizens across the province about the cuts to services and, in particular, the closures of emergency departments and hospitals in small, rural and northern communities, by creating a Rural and Northern Healthcare Panel to look into the provision of healthcare services in remote, small-town and rural Ontario.

There was rejoicing amongst those of us here in Niagara who had been giving much time and energy to the fight to keep hospitals in Fort Erie and Port Colborne open, and to oppose the Niagara Health System’s Hospital Improvement Plan, which calls for the cutting of major departments at the Welland General and the Greater Niagara General, and the integration of these departments into the new hospital complex the Niagara Health System is building in west St. Catharines.

After all, previous efforts, including the carefully assembled reports and submissions from Port Colborne and Fort Erie, the pleas from the mayors of these municipalities, as well as from the opposition and from Liberal MPP Kim Craitor, had resulted in a deafening silence from Queen’s Park. Now, at last, our concerns would be taken seriously!

The Ontario Health Coalition and the Ontario Medical Association, along with other groups in Ontario, called for the new Panel to consult with Ontario residents affected by the decisions made by the Ministry and its Local Health Integration Networks (LHINs).

To no avail.

“Since last summer, we have asked the government to conduct meaningful public consultations as their hospital policies are fundamentally changing the public’s access to needed health care,” says Natalie Mehra, director of the Ontario Health Coalition. “But when the McGuinty government revealed the mandate of their rural and northern panel last fall, not only does it fail to mention the word “hospital”, there were no plans to conduct public hearings until after the panel had completed its work and made its recommendations to the Minister of Health.”

In response to the government’s own lack of response, the Ontario Health Coalition, in partnership with dozens of community groups in rural and northern Ontario, has decided to instill some democracy into the Panel’s process, by holding a series of public hearings, “with an eminent panel that cannot be ignored”.

These hearings will enable the collection of concerns and ideas from individuals and groups in every region of the province, from which a report — one that REALLY reflects Ontario’s healthcare needs — will be created. This report will be released publicly and brought into the legislature and given to the Premier and the Health Minister.

The Hearing in Niagara will take place on Tuesday, March 9, from 3:00 to 6:30p.m., at the Welland Lions Club, 414 River Road. Niagara residents, groups and organizations are encouraged to make short (seven minute) oral presentations, addressing the following questions:

· What are your concerns about your local hospital services?

· What role does your hospital play in your local health system your community, your life and the lives of your family?

· What gaps in service are you experiencing?

· What ideas and recommendations do you have for the future of your local hospital?

To book a presentation, please contact the Ontario Health Coalition Contact ASAP at 416-441-2502 or by email at ohc@sympatico.ca

Please note: the deadline to book a presentation is March 1st.

This invitation is extended to ALL Niagara residents. The integration of hospital services will seriously affect access for those living in larger urban centres, as well as those not yet threatened with immediate closure of their local hospital. Welland residents, for example, will testify to the increased wait-times since the closure of the Port Colborne Hospital. Many St. Catharines residents have long been concerned that the new hospital that they thought was supposed to serve their needs will soon be the only hospital for the majority of Niagara’s citizens.

The McGuinty-Matthews theme-song on healthcare, “fewer hospital services = better quality of health care”, means that all of us, wherever we live, are going to feel the effects of hospital integration. And it’s not going to be pretty, for any of us.

So let’s take advantage of this chance to tell our government what we think.

(Fiona McMurran a resident of Welland, Ontarion and is the contact person for
South Niagara Chapter of the Council of Canadians.)

(click on www.niagaraatlarge.com for related stories on this and other topics of interest and concern to residents across the greater Niagara region.)