EDMONTON — Today, after two weeks of waiting for answers into very serious allegations of government interference in Alberta’s health care contracting procurement process, Premier Danielle Smith and Health Minister Adriana LaGrange finally held a press conference to announce nothing new. There was no information provided as to the timeline or lead for the promised independent third-party review, and the Premier continued to double down on their failed approach to surgical wait times.
“The Premier and the Health Minister have been concerningly quiet, considering the gravity of the ongoing allegations. Albertans are justifiably worried about whether government interference is occurring in our procurement,” says Chris Gallaway, executive director of Friends of Medicare. “We deserve real transparency and accountability from our elected officials, but we didn’t get that today. Instead we got a rant defending privatization, with no concrete actions towards accountability.”
Since the initial story broke alleging that the former Alberta Health Services CEO, Athana Mentzelopoulos, along with the entire AHS board, was dismissed before she could meet with the province’s Auditor General regarding her investigation into private surgical contracts, Albertans have continued to see the release of further claims of misconduct from the government, prompting calls for a full public inquiry and/or the removal of the Health Minister, including from community members, unions representing Alberta’s health care workers, and even UCP cabinet members.
“Frankly, today’s announcement is too little too late, and ultimately changes nothing,” says Gallaway. “With the CEO and Board of Alberta Health Services gone, government-appointed bureaucrats are now exclusively in charge of AHS, meaning it is no longer an arm’s length entity from the Health Minister. Albertans cannot trust that any proper independent investigations can happen unless the Health Minister resigns, to show the government is serious about a truly independent public inquiry into these allegations.”
Since being elected, the government has increasingly spent substantial public health care dollars to subsidize the profits of private entities throughout our health care system, pursuing an aggressive privatization agenda including signing secretive contracts with for-profit health care providers to expand their role throughout health care, in surgeries, labs, addictions care, food services, laundry, ambulance services and more.
The Premier claims these decisions are being made in order to address lengthy surgical wait times, but the truth is, report after report after report have shown that the privatization of Alberta’s surgeries to for-profit facilities is costing us more, while ultimately reducing overall capacity. This past December, the government rejected a $240,000 proposal to resume public orthopedic surgeries at Edmonton’s Royal Alexandra hospital.
“The real status quo is secretive, backroom deals in our healthcare. It’s what has gotten us into this mess,” says Gallaway. “This government has stubbornly doubled down on prioritizing more of these lucrative private contracts, rather than investing in bolstering operating rooms in our public hospitals, and Albertans deserve to know why. That means full transparency in terms of what the Alberta Surgical Initiative is costing us, how contract decisions are being made, and who's profiting from this approach.”
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