Prediction: Every remaining drop of the screwball Turkish children’s medicine bought by Alberta’s United Conservative Party last year for give or take $100 million just to own the Libs is going to have to be poured down the drain. Then deputy premier Nathan Neudorf, at left, and then health minister
Continue readingTag: Alberta Health Services
Alberta Politics: Expect more chaos in health care, already overwhelmed and at the brink, as AHS ‘senior leaders’ get orders to cut costs
With Alberta’s overwhelmed public health care system once again teetering at the brink, a memorandum from Alberta Health Services’ acting chief financial officer to its “senior leaders” telling them they must find ways to cut costs has surfaced. Michael Lam, Alberta Health Services acting chief financial officer and vice-president of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Danielle Smith dodges and weaves, but doesn’t deny, report government ordered AHS not to mention COVID or flu in vaccine ads
Grilled by reporters about yesterday’s news the United Conservative Party Government ordered Alberta Health Services not to use the words “COVID-19” or “influenza” in its seasonal vaccination advertising, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith dodged, weaved and prevaricated, but didn’t outright deny the truth of the report. Take Back Alberta founder David
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Ethics investigations, Alberta, style – no rules were broken when Deena Hinshaw was fired! Now please move along, folks …
You were wondering about that ethics investigation into the way former Alberta chief medical officer of health Dr. Deena Hinshaw was immediately re-fired after she was hired as a member of Alberta Health Services’ Indigenous Wellness Core last June? Was it Premier Danielle Smith? She says not (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr).
Continue readingAlberta Politics: After a day of negotiations, deal lightly taps the brakes on mass Christmas clearances of Edmonton homeless camps
Lawyers for the Edmonton police and the city of Edmonton on one side and the Coalition for Justice and Human Rights on the other reached a deal last night that lightly taps the brakes on pre-Christmas sweeps to bust up eight homeless encampments in the city’s downtown core. Justice Kent
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Danielle Smith delivers more promised chaos in health care with purge of six senior AHS executives
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith – she basically promised chaos in health care and she’s delivering it (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). The politically inspired purge of senior Alberta Health Services officials by the United Conservative Party that has now begun is likely to paralyze decision making throughout the provincial health care system. The
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Danielle Smith summons Ed Stelmach, Lyle Oberg from the Alberta political crypt to help sell the breakup of AHS
It was an interesting strategy for Premier Danielle Smith’s government to trot out former premier Ed Stelmach, the man most associated with the creation of Alberta Health Services back in 2009, to act as a validator at the announcement yesterday of her plan to smash the province-wide health care agency
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Back to the future: UCP set to announce plan to bust up AHS, add reams of red tape, and politicize health care decisions
Health care in Alberta is moving confidently into the 1990s! Alberta Premier Danielle Smith (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). The United Conservative Party Government led by Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is about to bring the province’s health care system back to the future with a massive infusion of new red tape, just
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Local decision making comes to Alberta acute care facilities, potentially undermining patient and public safety
Alberta Health Services yesterday announced it will dump the responsibility for masking to slow the spread of COVID-19 in its acute care facilities on the leadership of its regional zones throughout Alberta and individual sites. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). In a memorandum on “enhanced masking at AHS
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Conservative Danielle Smith vows to dismantle Alberta Health Services, Conservative Ed Stelmach’s greatest achievement
Today’s political weather forecast: Ill winds that blow no good will begin throughout Alberta on Wednesday. Mr. Stelmach’s health minister, Ron Liepert, in 2012 (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). After that, conditions will get worse. Wednesday is when Premier Danielle Smith has promised us her health minister will present a plan
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Today is last day on job for AHS VP Deb Gordon, highest-ranking woman in the province-wide health agency
On Aug. 18, Alberta Health Services President and CEO Mauro Chies sent a memorandum to the province-wide public health care agency’s senior managers telling them that the highest ranking woman in their ranks would be leaving the organization today. AHS President and CEO Mauro Chies (Photo: Alberta Health Services). Deb
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Why saying Alberta Health Services’ original mandate was only running acute care hospitals is dangerous and false
A dangerously misleading statement appeared in an op-ed story under Health Minister Adriana LaGrange’s byline Thursday in the Calgary Herald. To wit, “that Alberta Health Services has evolved beyond its original acute-care hospital system mandate.” Alberta Health Minister Adriana LaGrange (Photo: Facebook/Adriana LaGrange). Everyone makes mistakes and most politicians spin
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta Health Services ordered back to the future: A catastrophe in the making, or just ideological window dressing?
The premier who centralized the management of Alberta Health Services under a single administrator who answers only to her now says she wants to decentralize the province-wide public health agency “to enhance local decision-making authority”? Alberta Premier Danielle Smith (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). What’s wrong with this picture? According to Danielle
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta Labour Board ruling yesterday in response to 2020 wildcat strike could cost AUPE $1.6 million
The Alberta Labour Relations Board has ruled that the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees broke the law when some of its health care members took part in a short illegal strike in the fall of 2020 and yesterday ordered Alberta Health Services to stop collecting union dues, assessments and other
Continue readingAlberta Politics: UCP’s ‘Alberta Surgical Initiative’ proves to be an expensive flop, reducing surgical capacity, failing to fix long wait times
The United Conservative Party’s “Alberta Surgical Initiative” to outsource publicly funded surgeries to private facilities is an expensive flop that has diverted resources away from public hospitals and reduced provincial surgical capacity, says a damning report released this morning by the Parkland Institute. The cover of the Parkland Institute’s report
Continue readingAlberta Politics: UCP plans to let private medical corporations provide some surgeries without qualified anesthesiologists in the Operating Room
I bet you didn’t know the United Conservative Party Government plans to let private medical corporations operating their own facilities perform surgeries even if the person delivering the anesthesia is not a physician specializing in anesthesiology. Alberta Health Minister Jason Copping (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). Alberta political blogger and corporate and
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Astonishing! It’s Budget Day and suddenly there’s no health care crisis, and Alberta Health Services is A-OK!
It’s a shocker! But it turns out there is no crisis at Alberta Health Services! NDP Seniors and Housing Critic Lori Sigurdson (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). No need to take my word for this. It comes straight from the lips of Dr. John Cowell, the sole Administrator appointed by Premier
Continue readingAlberta Politics: COVID-19 haunts us still, but if your vaccinations and boosters are fully up to date, AHS won’t let you have another one
COVID is still killing people in Alberta, but if you’ve been careful about keeping vaccinated and think it might be time for another booster, chances are you’re out of luck. COVID-19 vaccine (Photo: National Advisory Committee on Immunization). Obviously, whatever the United Conservative Party Government wishes, COVID-19 continues to kill
Continue readingAlberta Politics: UCP fires AHS board, names sole administrator, promises big changes fast: No such thing will happen
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith delivered on her long-promised shakeup of Alberta Health Services yesterday, firing the 11 members of the province-wide agency’s Conservative-appointed board and naming John Cowell as its sole administrator. Progressive Conservative premier Alison Redford (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). Alert readers will recall that Dr. Cowell was appointed
Continue readingViews from the Beltline: Gain Danielle Smith, lose Deena Hinshaw—not a fair exchange
On Monday Deena Hinshaw, Alberta’s chief medical officer of health, was in effect fired. Thus our new premier, Danielle Smith, kept a campaign promise. We get Danielle Smith, a conspiracy-spouting separatist; we lose Deena Hinshaw, a highly qualified medical professional. What is Alberta coming to. Hinshaw was the only reasonably
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