As this week marks my first sitting in the Manitoba Legislative Assembly as your representative, it is important for me to address some significant goals which I have heard from the people of Thompson.
As I have mentioned in the past, many of you who I have spoken to expressed strong concerns regarding health care.
Many healthcare facilities in Northern Manitoba have been affected by understaffing and underfunding. Thompson is facing a declining quality of care, due to a declining quantity of healthcare workers. Horror stories of paramedics having to staff the Thompson emergency room are occurring because of the cuts that our healthcare system has had to endure. These stories are particularly worsened coming at a time of greater need for care during the pandemic. Despite the crisis that the healthcare system is facing, the government has focused on dollars over patient care. We’ve also seen far too many people spending money to travel south to get health care services that should be provided much closer to home.
Thompson has been hit hard by the cuts, pushing patients to the south when they require specialized care, and removing jobs from healthcare workers when they are needed most. We have lost access to our foot care clinic, our brain injury services during the pandemic, as well as continuing to fall short in reproductive health care and complete of lack access for abortion care. This is unacceptable.
In the Northern Regional Health Authoritiy’s own words from their annual report, our facilities are “in a very fragile state” and nursing and health care aide gaps “are becoming more frequent.”
Honest representation means continuing to celebrate the work of our healthcare workers, and supporting them rather than abandoning them when we face crises of constraint.
As I have worked in healthcare previously, I know firsthand many of the challenges that we face in delivering sufficient care in Northern Manitoba.
As I will sit in session at the Legislative Assembly for the first time on Wednesday, I plan to take the government to task on their choices and inactions in the face of increased need for quality healthcare. We need to prevent a further erosion of the service, and that means committing to expanding services, not privatizing services like they did with Lifeflight in 2019.
I encourage anyone and everyone who has struggled with healthcare to contact my office to share your experiences, whether as a healthcare worker or patient in the north. Your voices must be heard. When I have the opportunity, I will make your voices heard and will do whatever I can to make healthcare more accessible northern communities, and commit to seeing services upgraded rather than cut.
You can call my office at 204-677-4789, reach us by email at Eric.Redhead@yourmanitoba.ca, or come see us at 402-79 Selkirk Avenue in Thompson. I look forward to hearing from you and fighting for you.
