Horwath talks health care
Pledges fix for “hallway medicine” by adding 2,000 hospital beds
KITCHENER — Erna Durksen has never voted NDP in her life.
But the retired teacher was at the very front of the line to hear New Democratic Party Leader Andrea Horwath talk about health care Tuesday evening before a crowd of more than 100 people.
“I got a phone call from the Conservatives, and I said, ‘You get me a new leader and I might vote for you,’” said Durksen, who isn’t keen on the party’s current leader, Doug Ford.
“And Liberal? I don’t think so,” she continued.
“She spends too much,” Durksen added, referring to Premier Kathleen Wynne.
So Durksen, who lives in Kitchener-Conestoga riding near Highway 7 between Kitchener and Guelph, decided to come with her daughter to Tuesday’s “town hall” meeting and listen to Horwath with an open mind.
The meeting on health care was held at Open Sesame, a small design shop, gallery, performance space and bookstore beside Kitchener City Hall. With more than 100 people attending, it was packed and a speaker was placed outside for the overflow crowd to listen.
Horwath spoke about flaws in Ontario’s health-care system. She said hospitals are routinely overcrowded across the province, including St. Mary’s in Kitchener and Grand River hospitals.
This leads to a situation Horwath called “hallway medicine,” in which hospitals keep patients in halls because there aren’t any rooms.
Patients in this situation have “no privacy, no dignity, without access in many cases to a call bell.”
She said she has heard of patients on stretchers being kept near the nursing station because of lack of space. They’re in hospital “night after night with all the lights on.
“I don’t think these things are conducive to healing, do you?” she said.
Horwath said a New Democratic Party government would give hospitals a 5.3 per cent increase, which would help open 2,000 more beds right away.
As for mental health, Horwath said children are waiting a year for treatment, which she called “shameful.” She pledged to get the wait down to 30 days after diagnosis by hiring 2,600 new mental health workers.
Horwath also promised a separate ministry for mental health so that the issues stay on the front burner.
“Good idea,” murmured Durksen from her seat near the back.
Durksen taught students from kindergarten to Grade 12 in the Guelph area, and often noticed that some of the students needed extra attention for mental health issues.
But “it took a long time to get any kind of help,” she said.
On long-term care for seniors, Horwath promised four hours of “hands-on” care every day for each patient, and an additional 15,000 beds over the next couple of years to help ease long waiting lists.
In the question-and-answer
period, one retired woman told Horwath she had recently needed dental care, and had to borrow more than $5,000 to get the work done, even though she had a dental plan.
Horwath acknowledged that the governing Liberal party has also proposed a dental care program.
But “Kathleen Wynne and the Liberals have had 15 years to make it right,” she told the crowd.
“It’s too little, too late. They’ve had their chance.”
And Ford has promised lower taxes, plus spending cuts amounting to $6 billion.
“Mr. Ford’s cuts are not going to get rid of hallway medicine,” she said.
Horwath said her entire platform has been costed, and the extra health-care funds will come from “asking the richest Ontarians and the richest corporations to chip in a little bit more.”
Most opinion polls show Horwath’s NDP rising in popularity and becoming the main challenger to the front-running Conservative party. The ruling Liberals are in third place.
When the event ended, Durksen said she was impressed by Horwath.
“Her health plan sounds so real, and caring and loving,” she said.
Durksen hasn’t made up her mind for whom to vote, and says she’ll keep listening to all the leaders.
But she liked Horwath’s plan because it focused on the needs of seniors and children.
“They’re the most vulnerable,” she said.