More policy on the fly from Redford: Family Care Clinics

Updated: see bottom of post!

Today Premier Redford announced if she is elected that 140 family care clinics will be created in Alberta over the next 3 yrs.  Sounds wonderful but it looks like a desperation move and policy on the fly on her part for a number of reasons.

It was only a couple of weeks ago, March 22nd, that she announced 3 family care clinics that were to be built as a "pilot" project.  What happened in 2 weeks to turn a small pilot project of 3 into 140?

The cost for the 3 was to be 15 million dollars, making the cost of 140 ( if you believe the gov't numbers which are almost ALWAYS wrong) to be 700 million dollars. 700 million dollars that were NOT in the budget and which will make Redford's promises on a surplus next year all but impossible to keep. ( Don't forget that pre-election spending spree of at least $182 million un-budgeted dollars as well)

Also, how does 700 billion in new spending fit into Bill 1, the 'results based' budgeting bill where all money spend was to be evaluated based on results? This was entirely possible with the 3 'pilot' clinics, but to jump to 140 without knowing if the results does not exactly fit with what Redford passed as law in Alberta.


And lastly and perhaps the most important of all: Where will all the doctors, nurses and other staff come from to staff these 140 clinics?  We already have a known doctor shortage in this province and now with the gov't deciding to open 140 clinics, where will these doctors come from? Will they decide to close their private offices to work in a government run clinic, creating other problems? The same can be said about nurses, who currently find themselves often working short due to staff shortages in our existing hospitals and it is already creating undue stresses on the staff and the system. Where are we planning to get enough nurses to not only fix the existing shortages but also staff 140 new clinics?


It's more policy on the fly from a premier scrambling to stem the bad poll numbers with only 2 weeks to go before the election and the possible end of a 41 year political dynasty.

Update: Redford claims that the new clinics can be funded with existing money from AHS and will not cost any additional money.  How is that even possible? You would have to reduce money going somewhere else and the PCs never cut anything so where would it come from, and that does not even get into the issue of staffing the new clinics unless of course they plan to move existing staff out of hospitals and into the clinics!!!
To put it nicely the claim that this will not cost any additional cash is BS.

Alberta Medical Association president Dr. Linda Slocombe: Tory party campaign promise also goes against the Health Quality Council of Alberta recommendation earlier this year that the government undertake no further major re-structuring of the health-care system without a clear rationale, a transition plan and consultation. 



Wildrose press release on the issue.

Redford's Healthcare inquiry: It's a whitewash.

The Terms of Reference are out for the planned healthcare inquiry and even though I am not a lawyer it is quite easy to see that in-spite of what the Premier promised and later tried to spin, the healthcare inquiry has been handcuffed into ONLY looking at queue jumping and ONLY queue jumping that "is occurring." (For all you other non lawyers please note the tense of the word occurring.)

Read the Terms of Reference your self here.

Pursuant to section 17 of the Health Quality Council of Alberta Act, the Lieutenant Governor in Council orders that a public inquiry be held concerning the possibility of improper preferential access being given to publicly funded health services and, specifically, the terms of reference for the inquiry shall be to consider:

1.  Whether improper preferential access to publicly funded health services is

    occurring;  and

                        2.   If there is evidence of improper preferential access to publicly funded health services
                            occurring, make recommendations to prevent improper access in the future.
 

Not even close to what Redford promised (link now dead but see bottom of this blog), not anywhere near the way she tried to spin it, and not what Albertans expected or deserve.

It's a whitewash. 

The judge has NO choice or leeway to expand or go beyond these instructions PERIOD, any claims that the judge can investigate anything other than what is listed in these terms is quite simply BS.

Our Premier is a lawyer and was also our justice minister; she not only knows exactly what the terms of reference mean, she also had a big hand in writing them and an even bigger hand in spinning them to the public.

And sadly most Albertans won't have figured it out until long after the election. Which was the PC plan all along.


Updated with the article linked to above. ( if media wouldn"t delete their articles there would be no need to reproduce them in full, which I now feel I have to do just to prove I am not making stuff up.)

What Alison Redford has said about need for a health-care inquiry

Calgary Herald

Published: Friday, March 02, 2012

- Redford leadership campaign news release on June 7, 2011:
Alison Redford, in light of growing accusations of political interference in the health-care system, has called for a judicial inquiry.
The inquiry will focus on charges of political interference into the provincial health system.

"Dr. Duckett, in his address on May 5th, stated outright that before his tenure as CEO of the AHS, people of the 'political class' were accustomed to being granted higher access in the system than those who were not as connected," stated Alison Redford, candidate for leader of the PC party.
"This statement, when combined with earlier allegations of a culture of intimidation, has provided an impetus to call for an independent inquiry."
"My call for an inquiry is about finding out the truth and putting a stop to practises that go against my personal and political values ..."

- In the legislature Nov. 21, 2011, in response to a question about the alleged intimidation of one doctor concerned about a health-care facility closure in Calgary:
"Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to see that, in fact, if someone does have concerns with respect to doctor intimidation, they would be prepared to come to an inquiry. The legislation will be tabled in the house today to ensure that that can happen."

- Speaking to reporters in Calgary on Feb. 24, 2012:
Herald's Don Braid: "You said when you made your statement in the summer about the inquiry that it should - you're talking about political interference, I believe you refer to that and intimidation. Are you going to make both of those issues part of the inquiry?"
Redford: "It has to be."

- Redford at a March 1 news conference:
"I, in my heart, believe and know that the commitment that I made last June is the commitment that we honoured this week. I want to make sure that we've dealt with queue jumping in the health-care system and last summer, I made a commitment to have an independent judicial inquiry with respect to that....
"I have not backed down one bit from what I said that I would do."

© Calgary Herald 2012

 

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 *I would rate this article a 9 out of 10.

 

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Bonus pay for me, pay cut for you.

Old Fast Eddie's government is into it again, this time over bonuses paid out to the executives at Alberta Health Services. The same AHS that currently is trying to roll back the wages of nurses in Alberta.

They paid millions to pay out contracts, which didn't have to be bought out, for the old health executives, and now AHS has decided to give themselves a little something extra as a bonus for what has to be very dubious results. Been to a hospital in Alberta lately?

But yet the government came out and defended the bonuses.

Is anyone surprised?

H1N1: How concerned were the opposition Liberals?

They were so concerned that if Ignatieff had his way we would be into the last week or two of a 300 million dollar national election campaign as you read this; right in the middle of the "H1N1 hysteria". Now that is concern if I had ever heard it.

Updated(thanks CJ) Here is what Bob Rae had to say (approx 30 min mark) about campaigning in a possible H1N1 outbreak:"I'll kiss anybody who comes forward. I don't think that's going to be an issue for us in the campaign. I think it's going to be a very positive exercise, if we have one, ..."



Just something to think about while you watch fake Liberal outrage on a television screen near you.



Some more to think about:



Back at the end of August of this year, Liberal MP and medical doctor Carolyn Bennett said the following:

“Asked directly whether Canada is prepared to donate any surplus vaccine, the Conservative government – which has purchased 50.4 million doses of the H1N1 vaccine for Canadians from GlaxoSmithKline – ruled nothing in or out….

[Francoise] Baylis [a bioethicist at Dalhousie University in Halifax] said Canada’s 50 million doses should be more than enough to handle the number of people who want and need the vaccine. Assuming two doses of vaccine are needed per person, there is enough for 75 per cent of Canada’s 35 million people.

The expectation at this point is that only about 60 per cent of the population will want to be vaccinated, she said, meaning a surplus is likely.

Liberals and New Democrats say they’re prepared to push the government to step up to the plate.

‘Canadians have long understood that on this tiny planet we’re only as safe as the whole planet,’ said Liberal MP Carolyn Bennett, the party’s health critic.

Bennett said Canadian authorities should know by Christmas how much vaccine will be needed, and whether people should have one or two doses.” ht Sandy


Did you catch that? Canada should step up to the plate as we would have enough vaccine to give away and that the authorities should know by Christmas just how much will be needed by Canadians! Christmas! That sure is a far cry from what Bennett has been saying lately isn't it?




Oh and how can we forget that the reason that there is only a single source supplier for the vaccine in Canada is because of a 325 million dollar deal signed by Liberal PM Jean Chretien with GSK that runs until 2011. Coincidentally the same year as that deal was signed the Liberal Party of Canada received a donation of $56,000 from GSK. Another Liberal talking point bites the dust.



Playing politics with H1N1 is going to backfire on the Liberals even more-so than their other recent lame attempts at creating scandal. They are cementing the notion in the minds of the electorate that the Liberals are the party that contributes nothing other than faux scandal and faux outrage. And make no mistake that this will be remembered. Poor Peter Donolo. Only 1 week into his new job and he already has an epic failure on his record.


Updated with video of the CTV story:

Stelmach and Liepert: a comedy duo.

What a mess.  Alberta close H1N1 clinics to public.

Alberta Health Minister Ron Liepert Oct 30, 2009: "We launched this program with the ask that the first week would be for those who were most susceptible and at high risk. We also launched by encouraging all Albertans to get vaccinated because all of the indicators we had was that far too many people were going to say this, too, will pass and I don't need to get vaccinated."

Really? They were asking that the first week of vaccinations would be for high risk people only.

Ed Stelmach Oct 28, 2009:"We're the province that is offering flu vaccines for every Albertan, not just to the high-risk groups."

Okay, so that was Wednesday and maybe the Premier was not aware of the long line ups and other problems, even though he would have been the only one in Alberta to not be aware. I guess he missed it when his Health Minister had to apologize to Albertans for the long lines on the 27th

But here is what he said on Thursday.
Ed Stelmach Oct 29, 2009:"We're not asking only those high-risk groups to get the vaccine first. It's open to all."

Nothing like conflicting messages to make Albertans feel better about how this government deals with their health. These guys could be the next Wayne and Shuster.

You can read more about just how messed up these 2 are here.

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For the record I received my H1N1 shot on the 27th, which was day 2 of the program, and before somebody compares me to Hedy Fry looking for my entitlements, I do fit the criteria.

On Body bags and Boy Scouts

While Michael Ignatieff was busy spending some of his 34 years out of the country he once called Canada a "herbivorian boy scout".

Well that was then and this is now: Michael Ignatieff September 17, 2009 on a routine shipment of body bags: “When that is combined with the fact...that they haven’t sent preventative measures that can save those lives, it sends a message of callous lack of compassion.” "It sends a message, it simply says: 'We expect Aboriginal Canadians to die,'"

It makes for a nice soundbite but he seems to have forgotten the boy scout motto.

Be prepared!

Sorry if it offends your sensibilities Michael, I honestly think it doesn't and this is just another example of the opportunist and his "pretend to have emotions that you do not actually feel" in action, but preparing for a possible H1N1 pandemic includes PREPARING for the fact that people will die. To not do so would be nothing short of negligence on the part of Health Canada and you would be crying about that if given the opportunity.




Related: In his presser September 11th he said the following to a question about how the government could be doing more on H1N1: " public information, public health campaigns and get the vaccine ready. I mean in my view they have been treading water on this all summer."

Yes folks, the 'we can do better' party would put on their white lab coats and go out to make the vaccine themselves for Canadians. Take that you evil Stephen Harper.

From today: Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh said that First Nations communities like Ahousat on Vancouver Island are already reporting a flu outbreak, but the government's vaccine will be too late to help.

Some facts:The vaccine is not yet being used anywhere in the world. Australia is scheduled to be the first nation to start vaccinations but not until about September 30th.

H/T: To quote a comment at The Halls of Macademia. "Ujjal Dosanjh is talking out of his ass again."


Update: While the Liberals are playing politics the government gets work done.

Another Update: Oct 8, 2009: Even thought he Liberals tried to make a scandal out of this it was all much ado about nothing.

Salt: Global National confuses Canadians Even More.

A Global National news story just may have confused Canadians on how to reduce their salt intake. Some background: A study from Stats Canada came out today stating that Canadians are eating too much salt for their own good.

This is something that we all should be paying attention to because increased salt intake has been linked to increased blood pressure (hypertension) which can also lead to numerous other serious conditions including among others, stroke and kidney disease. The recommended amount of salt intake for an adult is 2300 mg per day but the study found that the Canadian average in 2004 was closer to 3100 mg or almost 1/3 more than the maximum recommended intake! High salt (sodium) intake is a very serious problem to be sure, but the solutions are so simple that with just a little education Canadians can easily reduce their sodium intake and by dong so greatly reduce their risks for hypertension related diseases.

Education is the key but earlier tonight on Global National a story on the study may just have confused more people than it helped. Watch the segment here (under Tuesday Apr 10th. Note link will only be active for 1 week). While you watch the segment listen for when Hannah Bourdreau says the following "Health experts say read the label. If salt is listed in the first four ingredients, that means there is too much; so pick something else." and pay close attention to what he video shows while this is being spoken. Below is a screen shot of what has me concerned.

Did you notice anything wrong? I know some of you have figured it out but I am guessing that many if not most of you have no idea as to what my beef is with this story.

Hannah talks about ingredients yet the video is not showing the ingredients list but instead is showing the nutritional information. Call it nit picking, but if you are supposed to not eat anything with sodium listed in the top four ingredients and you look to the nutritional label as replacement for the ingredients list; you are going to either give up even trying to reduce your sodium intake or die of starvation because sodium, by law, is almost always listed forth from the top. I looked all over the house tonight to find a nutritional label that did not list sodium (give it a try yourself) in the top 4 but was not able to find even 1 item that qualified, or in fact one that contained 0 mg of salt.

Overall the story was well done and covered the basic points, but due to a short 10 second bit of video, the message and the concept as to just how easy it is to reduce your sodium intake may have been lost entirely to numerous people. In a country where many already find nutritional information labels confusing, poor editing of news stories is certainly not going to help out the situation.

Al