Now that most of the province’s ambulances and their crews have finally all been transferred to Alberta Health Services (AHS), the United Conservative Party (UCP) has decided to transfer them all again, this time to its redundant and unneeded Acute Care Alberta entity.
The changeover will officially take place on April 1, which seems appropriate.
Why is this being done? That was certainly not clear from Health Minister Adriana LaGrange’s news conference.
According to a canned quote attributed to LaGrange in her rambling news release, “from the beginning of our refocusing efforts, we’ve emphasized the importance of creating organizations dedicated to specific sectors, allowing health care workers to focus on what they do best. By moving emergency health services to Acute Care Alberta, I am confident it will receive the focused attention needed to deliver the care Albertans deserve.”
Like most of the official explanations for the UCP’s continuing effort to smash AHS to smithereens, this does not make a lot of sense, especially in the absence of any coherent exposition of how shuffling the province’s ambulances off to a new agency that does exactly what AHS did only with more bureaucrats will have any effect whatsoever on the service their overworked paramedics are able to deliver.
If it appears to be anything, yesterday’s announcement looks like a shell game, which the online Merriam-Webster Dictionary describes in a short commentary as “a swindling trick in which a small ball or pea is quickly shifted from under one to another of three walnut shells or cups to fool the spectator guessing its location.” Sums of money are usually involved.
In a response to yesterday’s murky announcement, Health Sciences Association of Alberta (HSAA) President Mike Parker described the plan as being “about changing letterhead, not changing lives.”
Speaking as the leader of the union that represents Alberta’s Emergency Medical Services (EMS) employees, Parker observed that “no one calling 9-1-1 is worried about whether it’s EMS or AHS or Acute Care Alberta. They’re worried about who is arriving and how long it’s going to take.” This is, of course, a profound truth, as anyone who have ever needed to call an ambulance understands.
“The government could not articulate how many more staff will be added to the system,” Parker observed in a short video distributed to media.
The government news release talks of investing more in EMS services, buying “upgraded vehicles and equipment,” and creating yet another new agency to manage services that used to be shared relatively seamlessly within AHS, but Parker noted that “they don’t know when these ambulances will be ordered, when they will arrive, or where they will be deployed.” Or who will operate them, it should be noted as well.
However, the government release re-announced EMS funding first announced in in last month’s budget.
Parker – whose union is in contract negotiations with AHS – called on the government to treat paramedics with more respect. “Invest in staff. Pay them better, treat them better. Retain them, recruit them, and above all, respect them.”
But beyond revenge for AHS’s public health measures during the pandemic – a personal hobbyhorse of Premier Danielle Smith since long before she has publicly contemplated a return to politics – one goal of the deconstruction of AHS is widely seen as a way to make it easier to privatize the public health care services it provides.
As for the timing of yesterday’s non-announcement, that is a little easier to crack. Still mired in scandal, coping with a couple of fractious caucus members, having lost one of its raisons d’être with the resignation of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and painted into a corner by the behaviour of Smith’s hero, Donald Trump, the UCP needs to look busy.
Meanwhile, yesterday’s newser meant LaGrange had to field reporters’ questions about Premier Smith’s nutty idea last week to get rid of the off-brand Turkish-made children’s acetaminophen the government bought for dubious reasons in 2022 by pawning it off on war-torn Ukraine.
Smith’s scheme to embarrass Trudeau during a brief national shortage of children’s pain meds became a continual thorn in the side of the UCP when the stuff turned out to be too thick to safely administer to infants, improperly packaged for use in Canada, and the subject of a questionable and controversial $70-million deal.
The embarrassment grew more acute when the shortage soon evaporated, just as the feds said it would. Millions of bottles are still sitting around in storage in Alberta nearing their expiry date and many more have never been delivered by the Turkish manufacturer.
So “Tylenot,” as the stuff came to be known, is a gift to this province’s political commentators that just won’t quit giving!
Say what you will about the health minister, though, she’s a trooper, always willing to look foolish to defend her boss.
Asked why the government would send the stuff to Ukraine if it couldn’t be used here, LaGrange explained that these are “good quality drugs” and they administer pain medicine to kids through fatter tubes in Europe. “Our lines are smaller than what is used in Europe and in other countries where these products are being used.” So all should be well.
What a relief!
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