CRAIG: Canadians are dying while they wait for surgery
If you’re concerned about the state of health care in Canada, try asking your local provincial politician a simple question *– how many patients died last year in your province while waiting for surgery?
Many elected officials won’t be able to provide an answer as their government simply doesn’t track this important information.
The Vancouver Coastal Health region informed SecondStreet.org they don’t track the data, and information from Quebec was scarce at best. Many other health bodies don’t have the info or it was incomplete.
In Ontario, the government indicated that 1,096 patients died last year while waiting for surgery and 6,491 patients died while waiting for MRI and CT scans. The government wouldn’t break out their data to show the types of surgery patients were waiting for when they died or how their wait times compared with maximum recommended wait times. The province claims it’s confidential.
Oddly enough, the Nova Scotia Health Authority had no problem providing the data SecondStreet.org requested.
The Atlantic province shared extensive data and noted 51 patients died last year while waiting for surgeries which could have potentially saved their lives. In “just over three quarters” of those cases, patients waited longer than the recommended wait times.
Behind these numbers are, of course, real people with real consequences. Shannon Anderson, a mother of four from Ontario, developed a treatable heart problem last year. The government told her it would take at least a month before they could treat her condition. Sadly, she passed away after waiting several weeks for care, leaving behind four children.
We can’t forget that governments essentially have a monopoly on health care in Canada. Shannon didn’t have the option of going to a private clinic and paying for the procedure she required. The government doesn’t allow that choice. The same is generally true for private hip and knee operations and other procedures which can improve a patient’s quality of life.
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