27 October 2006

Lots of talk Georgie... where's the walk?

Liberal Health Minister George Smitherman, in the face of threatened Emergency Room closures because of overcrowding and a shortage of doctors, has announced more money for the failing health care system.

The reality is, you can announce 'til the cows come home', but if you're not actually doing something... it ain't gonna solve the problem.

Witness the city of Belleville, which has privately raised almost 2 million dollars for a desperately needed MRI machine.
Both QHC chairman Lloyd Churchill and chief of staff Dr. Barry Guppy have written to Health Minister George Smitherman in separate letters, urging approval for the MRI purchase.

But to date, no answer has been received, QHC board members heard at their monthly meeting Wednesday in Belleville. QHC first asked for approval to buy the MRI in January 2005.

The $1.8-million cost for the basic MRI, which provides three-dimensional scans and is a technological marvel that radiologists insist be in a hospital’s medical bag, has been raised in the community.
So... twenty months and 2 million privately raised dollars later, the McGuinty Liberals have yet to get back to the hospital board about this lifesaving piece of equipment.

The Chief of Staff, Dr. Barry Guppy has another concern.
Guppy said the hospital needs at least two radiologists to clear a backlog of people waiting for MRI or CT scans. Non-urgent cases have had to go to hospitals like Cobourg and Kingston to have the scans done.
As for George Smitherman's famous "announcements", the people of Belleville are just asking if he could simply answer the damn phone.

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