QUEEN’S PARK – Mike Schreiner, released the following statement in response to a report that the government will announce plans to significantly increase the number of surgeries performed in private for-profit clinics.
“By throwing open the door to private, for-profit operators, the Premier is setting the stage for a further deterioration of Ontario’s crisis-ridden healthcare system.
A flood of new private facilities performing routine procedures will take nurses and doctors away from the public system, adding to the critical staffing shortages in Ontario hospitals and leading to even longer wait times for urgent hospital surgeries.
Private facilities will not fix the problems at the heart of the province’s healthcare crisis. Lack of investment in hospital infrastructure and the government’s continuing refusal to offer fair wages and better working conditions to nurses and other frontline healthcare workers is at the heart of the problem.”