November 28, 2005

By Daniel Mark Wheaton

Physician recruitment is not a problem on Prince Edward Island, says Health Minister Chester Gillan.

Responding to continued questioning about hospitals and the shortage of family doctors during question period on November 24, Gillan said the government remained committed to strengthening health care.

“The provision of health care is one of government’s most solid responsibilities.”

Opposition Leader Robert Ghiz agreed that health care should be the province’s highest priority.

“Health care in our province must always be first class.”

But he argued that the system was falling short and called for changes.

Ghiz noted that, according to government figures, Prince Edward Island had 77 family physicians, while the government believed it needed 83.6, and he maintained that the real requirement was closer to 93.

He also argued that the province needed to do more to ensure physicians practised in rural communities, not just in the cities.

“A government that doesn’t prepare for the future is a government that lives in the past.”

Ghiz also questioned Gillan’s statement from the previous day that there was a 63 per cent probability the remaining physician vacancies would soon be filled.

After consulting an actuary from New Brunswick, Ghiz said he still couldn’t understand how the minister had arrived at such a precise figure.

Gillan explained that no statistical formula had been used.

“There’s six vacancies and we think that we have four.”

“I wasn’t talking about any mathematical formulas. I wasn’t talking about statistics.”

He added that until physicians signed contracts, the department could not count them as confirmed recruits.

Ghiz also accused the government of breaking its election promise to keep all Island hospitals open.

“It begins to appear like this government has a hidden agenda. That agenda seems to be based on the idea of starving health care and then forcing cuts.”

The comments came after a public meeting in Souris on November 23 to discuss the future of health services in eastern Prince Edward Island.

Ghiz said the purpose of the meeting was to preserve the hospital.

“This is not about closing the Souris hospital. This is about keeping it open.”

Gillan rejected the accusation that the government was reducing health services, pointing instead to increased spending.

When the Progressive Conservatives formed government in 1996, he said, the province’s health and social services budget stood at $282 million.

“Today that same health and social services budget has increased to $445 million.”