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WALKERTON: The news is bad for patients in South Bruce and Grey
Counties as the local hospital system will no longer provide outpatient
physiotherapy services.
The union representing health professionals at the South Grey
Bruce Health Services reacted angrily to the news of the changes which will take
effect April 1, 2009. Several staff face layoff as these services are to be cut
by the hospital.
Warren (Smokey) Thomas, president of the Ontario Public Service
Employees Union, said the decision would hurt patients, and was another example
of the withering away of the public health care system in our communities.
Thomas says the hospital’s administration has broken faith with
the public it is paid to serve.
“The administration of this hospital should be ashamed that it
is dismantling public health care in the very communities where they have been
entrusted to protect services,” said Thomas.
“Tommy Douglas did not say that some health care services
should be public. He said all."
Earlier this year, physiotherapy services at the Kincardine site
were contracted out to a numbered company. Hundreds of citizens protested. Now,
the hospital will no longer provide the service to outpatients at the Walkerton,
Chesley and Durham sites.
“What the hospital is saying to people is, we can’t provide a
full range of health care services, so if you can’t afford to pay, you’d be
better off living elsewhere.”
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