Failure of the Minister of Health to read the audit files on Ornge reflects a culture of complacency and favouritism to private interests

OTTAWA, Dec. 4, 2013 /CNW/ - The failure of the Ontario Minister to read audit reports on ORNGE reflects a culture of complacency and favouritism to private delivery at the ministry, CUPE charged today. Private sector delivery of health care has surged under the Liberal government, often with disastrous results. The air ambulance system, ORNGE, E-health, the P3 hospital disaster in Brampton have all featured enormous costs, little oversight and system failures.

" After the e-health scandal, how can the Minister choose not to read audit reports on ORNGE, which highlighted a $9.3 million income for that system's CEO? " asks Michael Hurley, president of CUPE's Ontario Council of Hospital Unions. " I am afraid that this happens because in its heart, this Ministry favours private sector delivery and has a breathtaking tolerance for system failures and fabulously expensive price-tags for privately delivered services. "

" The advice of the Minister to members of the public victimized by private endoscopy clinics caught charging illegal block fees in Ottawa was that they should seek reimbursement. There is a laissez-faire policy with respect to private sector interests at the Ministry ", Hurley says

" The British Medical Association Journal and the Canadian Medical Association Journal have documented the clinical shortfalls in private delivery: fewer services and higher death rates underwrite large profits. We have made this case to the government. What is particularly alarming is that this government is poised to push clinical services now delivered in hospitals into private clinics, despite all of this evidence."

SOURCE: Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (CUPE)

Michael Hurley, President, Ontario Council of Hospital Unions/CUPE
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