Niagara This Week - Niagara Falls

NIAGARA FALLS Outside of a proposed new hospital for Niagara Falls, health care has taken a back seat to issues such as job creation during the current byelection campaign, health care activists say.

"The health care issue in Niagara is one of the most pressing issues that we have in our region, " said Niagara Health Coalition chair Sue Hotte. "We do have some of the worst health care going in Ontario. Some of the implications of plan are far reaching and will impact many communities, not only within the riding (Niagara Falls, Fort Erie and Niagara-on-the-Lake, but also in Port Colborne and Welland."

They want that to change.

"We've never actually had situation when both the Liberal and the Conservative candidates refused to attend an all-candidates debate on health care," said Natalie Mehra, executive director of the Ontario Health Coalition, who joined Hotte and Ontario Public Service Employees Union regional board member Lucy Morton at the news conference at Niagara Falls City Hall on Monday.

"Whether you support the one hospital replacing five hospitals closing five hospitals and replacing it with one the public has a right to hear that debate. We think it's profoundly undemocratic that these candidates will not sit down and have a proper health care debate in this election."

"Niagara has from the beginning of the (Niagara Health System Hospital Improvement Plan) proposal, have seen among the worst hospital cuts in all Ontario. "Well over 100 hospital beds have been closed down here and well over 200 nurses and staff positions in the hospital have been cut already."

She said the current proposal to close five hospitals and replace them with a new south Niagara hospital in Niagara Falls comes without any guarantees to service levels.

"This is not in keeping with the history of health planning in Ontario," she said. "Formerly, when health care restructuring was proposed, it was actually clear how many hospital beds were proposed, the size of the hospital that was proposed, the services that would be in the hospital, etc. None of that has been made clear for Niagara."

Alan Sakach, a spokesman for Maves campaign, said Maves wants to take part in as many debates as possible.

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Lack of health care debate 'undemocratic', activists say