Health Care
Rural BC is a great place to live. But people are facing big challenges. Any interruptions to normal services at your local hospital are stressful, especially for anyone in an emergency situation needing immediate care. We need our ERs open. The big issue facing British Columbia and every province across Canada is a shortage of healthcare workers. That’s why we are taking action to recruit more healthcare workers, including nurses and doctors, with a focus on communities experiencing shortages, and also opening a new medical school next September with a focus of training people who want to work in communities across BC. We have introduced retention incentives in northern BC communities, on Vancouver Island, and in the Kootenay region as part of the BC Health Human Resources Strategy. As an example, eligible nurses who fill high needs vacancies in rural and remote communities will be eligible for signing bonuses including nurses who are new to BC’s health system. There are incentives such as relocation assistance, rural retention grant and BC loan forgiveness for nurses who accept regular roles in rural and remote communities. We’ve tripled the capacity of the program to credential internationally-trained doctors to get more trained health workers on the front lines, and we’ve added 128 spaces to UBC medical school across all campuses, including the North, Interior and Vancouver Island to train more doctors close to home. And after years where John Rustad and Kevin Falcon ignored rural communities’ calls for muchneeded new hospitals in rural communities, we are building new, state of the art hospitals in rural communities that improve care for patients and working conditions for healthcare workers to help with recruitment and retention. That includes Mills Memorial Hospital project in Terrace, Dawson Creek & District Hospital replacement, and the new Stuart Lake Hospital in Fort St. James. Community engagement is key. Through in-person events, online engagement, and working groups, health authorities have gathered community input to ensure the new space would be welcoming, functional and culturally safe for all, including medical professionals. These are big challenges. But John Rustad’s plan for deep cuts to the health care system, over $4 billion, would mean fewer doctors and nurses and would make these problems worse.
– British Columbia New Democratic Party
Coming Soon
– Conservative Party of British Columbia
Coming Soon
– Green Party of British Columbia
British Columbians expect a government to strengthen healthcare by investing in hospitals and bringing more doctors to BC whether it is Surrey, Vernon, Prince Rupert or Fort St John. While it’s too early to announce platform pieces, we will announce our commitments to British Columbians soon. But we’re not waiting for the election. Through our new deal with family doctors, in just the last two years we’ve hired 800 new family doctors in the last year alone. That’s helped connect 300,000 people to family doctors and nurse practitioners. While there are many more people who still need a family doctor – we’re headed in the right direction. There’s still more work to do. We have tripled the capacity of the program to allow more internationally-trained doctors and nurses to get to work. In the past year, over 900 internationally trained doctors (family doctors and specialists) have been licensed to practice in B.C. – getting trained professionals off the sidelines and into our clinics and hospitals. People want to know they’ll get the healthcare they need when they need it. David Eby is taking action by investing in hospitals and hiring more doctors. When John Rustad and Kevin Falcon were in government they did the opposite, they made cuts to healthcare funding to pay for tax giveaways for the top 2%. Despite promising a “GP for Me”, fewer British Columbians had a family doctor when they left office than had one when they started. We can’t afford to go back, not with the demands our growing population is putting on our healthcare system right now.
– British Columbia New Democratic Party
Coming Soon
– Conservative Party of British Columbia
Coming Soon
– Green Party of British Columbia