The Consequences of UCP cuts to Health Care in Alberta

[NAME REMOVED]

HIV rates in Alberta are up 73%, nearly doubled since 2019

Sunday marks World AIDS Day and doctors, researchers and community advocates are raising the alarm over the significant rise in HIV rates across Canada, including Alberta.

According to an annual report by Alberta Health, the number of reported HIV cases nearly double since 2019 and increased 73 per cent between 2022 and 2023. 

“Our clinics are busting at the seams. We’re doing more work with much of the same resources,” said Dr. Caley Shukalek, a Calgary physician and the co-founder Freddie, a company offering treatment and medications across the country. 

“It’s a struggle to get patients to be seen immediately on diagnoses and that’s just because we don’t have enough doctors experienced and interested in being the clinics. We have a shortage of a nurse supply and shortage of in-house pharmacists to help us manage these patients.”

https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/hiv-rates-in-alberta-are-up-73-nearly-doubled-since-2019-1.7129919

 

All the cuts to funding for Alberta health, and driving away Doctors from the province since 2019, has dire consequences for the public.

[eyeball]

1 hour ago, DUI_Offender said:

All the cuts to funding for Alberta health, and driving away Doctors from the province since 2019, has dire consequences for the public.

If their doctors are coming to BC then I'm good with it.

[CaringCdn]

Alberta Health is improving but slowly. I don't know about HIV issues - not in my purview but the rest will come. There's a shortage of doctors throughout Canada, not just in Alberta. Unfortunately, the healthcare in ALL provinces is behemoth & it takes time to make changes & turn things around. Being ill doesn't make it any easier, but it is what it is.

Unfortunately, the College of Physicians & Surgeons who control the number of doctors to be admitted, have refused to open up spaces so we can have more doctors' graduate. The organizations that medical professionals have to belong to are not too willing. I'm wondering since healthcare is a provincial responsibility, why the PROVINCES don't have more control over the admissions? This only makes sense. They can regulate the number of professionals in a given sphere so as to ensure that we have enough doctors & other professionals to serve our local communities. Why isn't this happening? It seems to me the organizations have more power over healthcare than our governments do. 

[SpankyMcFarland]

One distinctive aspect of Alberta health care for me was that they seemed to be constantly changing both the system and key personnel with all the hiring, firing, relocation and general confusion that comes with that. Even when they were fabulously wealthy you never what their plans would mean for particular jobs down the road. The core challenges of health care are obstinate beasts that don’t go away because you start renaming things. Anyway, I was looking at recent upheavals and this caught my eye. It seems to be more significant than the usual deck chair shuffling. 

Quote

 

Premier Danielle Smith’s government dismissed the head of Alberta Health Services two days before she was scheduled to meet with the province’s Auditor-General to discuss her investigation into procurement contracts and deals for private surgical facilities, according to a letter obtained by The Globe and Mail.

The letter also alleges that the Premier’s then-chief of staff interfered in AHS contract negotiations.

Alberta terminated Athana Mentzelopoulos as AHS’s chief executive on Jan. 8, replacing her with Andre Tremblay, the deputy minister of health. Ms. Mentzelopoulos, in a lengthy letter from her lawyer to AHS’s interim general counsel on Jan. 20, alleges that she was fired because she launched “an internal investigation and forensic audit” into AHS’s contracts and procurement processes.

AHS’s operations came under scrutiny after The Globe reported that members of Alberta’s government received gifts from a company that imported generic pain medication from Turkey for the health authority.

 

 

Quote

Leaders in politics and health care both called for investigations after the allegations were revealed. New Democratic Party Leader Naheed Nenshi, in a statement to The Globe, said the allegations are “exceptionally troubling.” The Health Sciences Association of Alberta, meanwhile, called the allegations scandalous and evidence that private surgical facilities undermine public health care.

“There must be a full RCMP investigation, an Auditor-General investigation, and a public inquiry,” Mr. Nenshi said.

He said key government players, including Ms. Smith, Health Minister Adriana LaGrange and Mental Health and Addiction Minister Dan Williams, must step aside while authorities dig deeper.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/alberta/article-alberta-ousted-health-services-ceo-amid-probe-into-medical-contracts/

 

 

 

 

Edited February 7 by SpankyMcFarland

[Black Dog]

It's not just that they're incredibly crooked, it's their so comically inept at hiding it. That or they just don't care because they know 1/3 of the rural rubes and a good chunk of Cowtown would vote for them no matter what.

[eyeball]

On 12/15/2024 at 8:46 AM, CaringCdn said:

Unfortunately, the College of Physicians & Surgeons who control the number of doctors to be admitted, have refused to open up spaces so we can have more doctors' graduate.

How we deal with this should be rolled up with measures we need to take that eliminate inter-provincial trade-barriers.

This is where Canada could benefit from a DOGE like process except to blow these barriers to kingdom come.

[SpankyMcFarland]

I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that Canada needs a mixed private and public health care system. The key matter for politicians to understand is that the for-profit sector should not mean profits for them. If they fail to resist temptation and put their little paws in the honeypot they will seriously set back the cause of private care in this country. 

[eyeball]

1 hour ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that Canada needs a mixed private and public health care system.

That sounds like our local clinic that's owned and operated by a couple of local doctors who have a health service contract with the BC Ministry of Health.

Or do you mean the same thing except it's under contract to the federal government instead?

Edited February 7 by eyeball

[SpankyMcFarland]

OK, these are still just allegations but Smith has been forced to deny them. It sounds like a very stupid way for a government to get into trouble if it did.

https://calgary.citynews.ca/2025/02/08/alberta-premier-smith-claims-not-involved-health-contract-allegations/

https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2025/02/07/Health-Care-Corruption-Allegations-Rock-Smith-Government/

Note Smith did not say there was absolutely nothing to these allegations at all, rather that she was not involved. 
 

Good news for Nenshi. He needed a boost.

 

Edited February 8 by SpankyMcFarland

[SpankyMcFarland]

Any Albertans here? What’s the local reaction to the RCMP getting involved in the health care kerfuffle? 

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/ahs-rcmp-investigation-1.7476869

 

[SpankyMcFarland]

On 2/7/2025 at 6:42 PM, eyeball said:

That sounds like our local clinic that's owned and operated by a couple of local doctors who have a health service contract with the BC Ministry of Health.

Or do you mean the same thing except it's under contract to the federal government instead?

I mean patients or companies directly paying somebody to provide care without government in between. I came to this conclusion after having to scramble for a GP for several years.