Health Minister Stephen Mandel and Alberta Health Services (AHS) CEO Vickie Kaminski held a press conference today to announce measures that aim to improve access to health care. However, the announcement raised more questions than answers. Mandel announced that they will be 'reallocating' $50 million from existing health care funds to the Peter Lougheed Hospital, South Health Campus, Misericordia Hospital, Royal Alexandra Hospital, and Grey Nuns Hospital to renovate and expand ER facilities.

Friends of Medicare was appalled to hear that the Alberta Government is delaying the long-awaited cancer centre planned for Calgary. The government first promised funding to increase capacity for cancer care in 2005, and last year the government promised a world-class cancer facility would be open in Calgary by 2020. Now they are refusing to commit to a timeline for its completion.

In May 2012, Jim Prentice joined the Board of Coril Holdings Ltd. Coril is a Calgary-based private investment company that owns Inliv, a big medical clinic in Calgary which aggressively markets a product called "Total Health Management," at a cost of $4,495 a year.

Friends of Medicare is standing in support of Banff community members and physicians who are in court today asking for an injunction and a judicial review to keep the maternity beds open at the Banff Mineral Springs Hospital.

After racking up millions of dollars in debt and leaving Albertans stuck with the bill, Networc Health, the parent company of the private surgical facility Health Resource Centre, is hardly in a position to boast as their medical director Stephen Miller was trying to do on Tuesday."