Provincial tour targets privatization

BY WENDY ELLIOTT

welliott@kentvilleadvertiser.ca

NovaNewsNow.com

The Nova Scotia Citizen’s Health Care Network has launched a provincial tour to raise awareness on the dangers of privatization and private, for-profit health care.

The tour will be in Wolfville Saturday, March 29. The location is room 244 in the Beveridge Arts Centre, Acadia University at 2 p.m.

The network has condemned a government move to outsource over 500 orthopedic surgeries to a private, for-profit clinic called Scotia Surgery.

“Outsourcing surgeries to private, for-profit clinics is not a solution to health care wait times,” says Kyle Buott, coordinator of the health network. “The minister should instead bring Scotia Surgery into the public system and create a state-of-the-art, publicly-funded and operated surgical centre in Nova Scotia.”

Scotia Surgery has and will continue to drain staff from the public system, Buott says. Although Capital Health surgeons will be performing all of the services, the support staff will be employees of Scotia Surgery.

“Scotia Surgery has already taken nurses from the public system,” Buott said. “Giving the private clinic access to this kind of money will allow them to continue to take staff from the public system, leading to shortages and longer waits.”

The services are going to be covered by MSI, but many questions remain.

“How long will it take for Scotia Surgery to decide it wants to do publicly insured services at a fee?” Buott asked. “The Minister of Health has opened the floodgate and, coupled with the Premier's comments on privatization in December and the push for new P3s, Nova Scotia public health care system is under a major threat.”