Political leaders challenged to attend meeting, provide answers

Guardian photo by Steve Sharratt

Souris Mayor David MacDonald

SOURIS Politicians of almost every stripe have been invited to attend a public meeting in Souris Tuesday night intent on improving health-care services for eastern P.E.I.

You could say our confidence is rather low since our message for better health care here has failed to gain any attention, says Alan MacPhee, eastern chair of Islandwide Hospital Access.

The goal of the group is to inform the public as a means of forming good public policy.

Thats why the group is hosting a public meeting at 7 p.m. tonight at the Souris regional high school and is taking the pre-election opportunity of inviting all the politicians. A distributed flyer says the group has invited all Liberal, PC and NDP leaders and candidates.

We have been poorly treated by Health P.E.I. and we are tired of it, said Souris Mayor David MacDonald. We need solid ambulance service as a start point to give rural communities some equity in the delivery of health services.

Health P.E.I. contends it is managing limited resources, but Islandwide Hospital Access says the problem is in the allocation of those resources. The group says Souris needs four doctors and is expected to be reduced to only two.

Health budgets have more than doubled, yet rural services have been cut, said MacPhee. This is the core of what we are calling rural discrimination. The problem is not the amount of money ... its the mismanagement of money.

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Health care meeting tonight in Souris