Nurses call for better public health care in submission to Conversation on Health
They say health care is too fundamental to the well-being of our community to be treated as just another commodity to be bought and sold in the private marketplace
"Health care is too fundamental to the well-being of our community to be treated as just another commodity to be bought and sold on the private marketplace, like luxury cars and big screen TVs."
That's what the BC Nurses' Union says in a comprehensive and hard-hitting submission to the provincial government's Conversation on Health.
The nurses say government claims about "unsustainable" health care spending are deceptive, if not outright false, pointing out that BC government health care spending has remained relatively constant as a proportion of the provincial economy.
The union says the keys to improving public health care are:
- Directing resources and energy to improving primary health care;
- Addressing the shortage of nurses, doctors and other health care providers;
- Dedicating resources and coordinated management to reducing waiting times for surgery within public facilities;
- Increasing services for seniors such as home care, home support and affordable assisted living and long term care;
- Controlling drug costs and implementing a national prescription drug insurance plan;
- Addressing the social determinants of health such as adequate incomes, quality child care, affordable housing, a safe and healthy environment.
To help address the nursing shortage, the nurses say government and health authorities must consider the impact of all decisions on nurses' work environment and on the ability of health authorities to keep and attract back the nursing staff needed to provide care to patients in the years ahead.
The nurses criticize schemes to send patients with less complicated health issues to private clinics or private urgent care centres set up separate from hospitals. Rather than reducing the burden on hospitals, sending less complicated cases off-site can actually increase the workload burden of hospital nurses because there is no relief from the sickest, most complicated cases, the nurses say.
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