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The Ontario Health Coalition says the province is on its way to a fully privatized health-care system, a claim the government has dismissed.
Published on May 30, 2024 • Last updated 25 minutes ago • 2 minute read
Henri Giroux, spokesman for the North Bay Health Coalition, said privatized health care will be introduced in Ontario unless people step up. Photo by Greg Estabrooks
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The crowd was small, but those who gathered tried to emotively express their belief that the Ontario Conservatives are trying to drag public health care into the realm of private health care.
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Henri Giroux and about 15 supporters gathered in front of Nipissing MPP Vic Fedeli's constituency office on Main Street around noon on Thursday.
Giroux was speaking at an event in North Bay while a larger protest over health care was taking place at Queen's Park.
Giroux says the current government is destroying the private health care system, which will be privatized if left unchecked. He says the fight needs to accelerate now before it's too late. Giroux argues Ontario has neglected its health care system for too long.
“We know that Ontario has the lowest (per capita) health care budget in Canada,” Giroux said, adding that most of the group that gathered outside Fedeli's office were seniors who were not affiliated with the labour movement and who just didn't want change.
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“Right now we have a health-care system. In the near future we will have a private health-care system. We will move to an American-style system,” said Giroux, who produced a flier explaining how the Ontario government already funds private health centres more than public ones.
MPP Vic Fedeli's office issued a media release outlining how the government feels about the protests happening across Ontario and the groups leading them.
“Facts matter, and while the Ontario Health Coalition, an NDP-backed special interest group out of touch with reality, has accomplished nothing over the last decade while ideologically opposing innovation in our health care system, our government is taking bold action to ensure more people can get the care they need, when they need it.”
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Under Premier Ford's leadership, the government has made record investments in our publicly funded health care system. Since 2018, the health care budget has increased by more than 31%, investing more than $85 billion in the system this year alone, including a 4% increase in the hospital sector, equivalent to the health care budgets of almost every other province and territory combined (Canadian Institute for Health Information).
Through the government's Your Health plan, we are continuing to take action to build on the progress we've made, including delivering a record-breaking year in 2023, adding 17,000 new nurses and 2,400 new doctors to our health care workforce, achieving the shortest surgery wait times in Canada, eliminating 180,000 delayed PAP tests and returning surgery delays to pre-pandemic levels, and making historic investments in paediatric and primary care.
This is in addition to the $1 billion investment we've made through the Surgical Recovery Fund to enable hospitals to use operating rooms on weekends and weekdays to perform more surgeries.”
(Catch up on what's happening in the North Bay region with our midday roundup. Click here to sign up for our free newsletter delivered to your inbox every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.)
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