‘Flatlined’ funding for EMS revived

Province giving ambulance services $20 million boost

Ambulance services across the province will get a funding increase of more than $20 million in this year’s budget.

The spending boost comes on the heels of concerns raised by paramedics about a strained EMS system.

“I am very pleased,” Mike Parker, president of the Health Sciences Association of Alberta, said from the legislature Thursday afternoon.

“It’s an improvement to the budget, and this budget has been cut and flatlined for far too long. So seeing the $20-plus million increase is exactly where it needed to go.

“We need to make sure it goes to the front lines and to protect the population of this province.”

Ministry of health spokesman Brent Wittmeier said $23 million in new funding from the province will go toward investments in new front-line resources such as stations, ambulances and paramedics, in addition to enhanced care in the community.

“AHS is assessing how best to allocate these resources and we are looking forward to working with our EMS partners,” he said.

The budget tabled by Finance Minister Joe Ceci on Thursday also includes $87 million for mental health and addictions, amid opioid use that the province describes as a continued “urgent public health crisis.”

According to Wittmeier, the $87 million is an increase of $14.2 million, or 19.6 per cent, and will be used to address the recommendations from the Valuing Mental Health Report, including grants to community organizations.

Part of the $87 million will go toward the province’s opioid response, in addition to other areas of the budget, for a total of $63 million — a $7 million increase from last year’s budget, Wittmeier said.

In 2017, 687 people died from opioid overdoses across the province, including 562 people who died from a fentanyl overdose.

Liberal MLA David Swann said more funding is needed for mental health supports.

“But they’re moving in the right direction — I have to give them that,” said Swann.

“There’s a desperate need for more front-line workers, more timely access for kids, particularly.”

Swann added the increased support for EMS is “much needed.”

“It’s much more than money that’s needed here,” he added.

“There’s a tremendous amount of waste in these professionals’ time as they sit and wait in emergency rooms and wait for transfer to a nurse.”

Capital funding outlined in the budget includes $4.6 million toward the redevelopment of the Peter Lougheed Centre’s emergency department, mental health intensive-care unit and laboratory.

Provincial health spending is expected to increase by three per cent this year, bringing spending to a total of $22.1 billion.