NDP contradicts on private health care

Re: “NDP promises to overhaul long-term care in B.C. over the next 10 years,” Oct. 1.

Premier John Horgan’s NDP government has done a good job handling the pandemic, but he is talking out of both sides of his mouth on the health-care file.

As the NDP is rightly putting more money into the health care of senior citizens living in facilities, Horgan was asked if he wanted to do away with private senior-citizen homes, and said: “I believe there can be a healthy mix.”

So why is a healthy mix acceptable in this situation, but not when it comes to other private health care?

As someone who had two failed foot operations in the public system and each time put at the back of the line, I turned to the Cambie Clinic only to learn that I am now forced to go back to a public system and wait more than two years.

Yes, I am fortunate to have the resources, but unfortunate that the system has me hobbling around for more than seven years.

In a recent Supreme Court of B.C. decision, it ruled in favour of the province over Cambie Clinic’s argument that long wait times are unconstitutional.

And here’s the rub: Rather than allow the clinic to continue as the appeal process moves along, the Horgan government is threatening sanctions against the clinic if it performs private surgeries, thus denying thousands of people in need of health care and creating even longer wait lists in the public health-care system.

Bill Currie Victoria