Health

Today was my turn to read a member’s statement in the house. I took the opportunity to talk about the incredible dedication of a group of parents who call themselves “Moms Like Us“. They are hoping to get a new clubhouse facility built somewhere in the CRD. It is clear to me that there is desperate need for such a facility here in the CRD and I am extremely supportive of the Moms Like Us initiative.

My Statement

Madame Speaker, I recently had the pleasure of meeting a group of parents who call themselves “Moms Like Us”. These parents all had something in common — an adult child or family member struggling with mental illness.

Moms Like Us became motivated to advocate for their adult children as they watched them becoming increasingly isolated and dependent.

Moms like us presented me with details of an established program called Clubhouse International with 322 clubhouses worldwide in 33 countries. This program is based on psychosocial rehabilitation, an innovative evidence-based, best-practice model that helps people living with mental illness lead productive lives. The clubhouse motto is a belief that everyone has a right:

1. To a place to come;
2. To meaningful work
3. To meaningful relationships;
4. To a place to return.

Internationally recognized, Fountain House was the first Clubhouse to open in New York City in 1948.  It has since blossomed into a global program that recognizes an individual’s potential through meaningful work and the support of a caring community.

Clubhouse International’s programs of social relationships and meaningful work have literally saved thousands of lives over the past 66 years.  Its program is a beacon of hope for those living with mental illness that are too often consigned to lives of homelessness, imprisonment, social stigma and isolation.

We have three Clubhouses in British Columbia: New Horizons Clubhouse in Port Alberni, Arrowhead Centre, in Sechelt, and Pathways Clubhouse in Richmond.

As the member from Richmond Steveston recently told the house, Pathways Clubhouse undertook an independent audit that showed that for every dollar invested in them there was a societal return on investment of $14. This means that the demand on hospitals, police departments and other emergency services was reduced as a result of having a Clubhouse International in Richmond. Those are the kind of economics we can all get behind.

Honourable Speaker, Moms Like Us are working towards the establishment of a Clubhouse International in the Capital Regional District. I ask that the house join me in wishing them every success in their endeavours.

Media Statement: July 18, 2014

New airshed study is a “nail in the coffin” for government LNG dreams in Kitimat

For Immediate Release

The new Kitimat Airshed study clearly shows that it is not possible to put four new LNG plants into the Kitimat airshed without “critical” impacts on human health according to Andrew Weaver, MLA for Oak Bay-Gordon Head and Deputy Leader of the BC Green Party.

“The B.C. Government is not painting a complete picture of the serious ramifications of this study,” says Andrew Weaver. “They are trying to paint what is actually a dire conclusion in good light to avoid undermining their LNG dreams. The study undeniably concludes that if you put four LNG plants into Kitimat you will have critical impacts on human health.”

The Kitimat Airshed Assessment study was commissioned by the B.C. Government to explore the impact that major industrial development would have on the Kitimat airshed. The study first considered the impacts of building four LNG plants and then considered the impacts of adding an oil refinery. It also considered various ways of mitigating toxic emissions.

The study concludes that even under the best case scenario with no oil refinery and with full treatment of Rio Tinto Alcan smelter emissions, four new LNG plants will raise sulphur dioxide levels to the point of causing “critical” risk to human health. Those plants will also increase nitrogen dioxide levels to the point of causing “high” risk to human health.

The study also concluded that the only way to avoid high or critical risk of aquatic ecosystem acidification is for all LNG plants to be powered by electric drives, for there to be no oil refinery and for the Kitimat smelter to implement a “full treatment” of emissions. The B.C. Government has already ruled out the possibility of electric-drive LNG plants, meaning it will be impossible to avoid high or critical levels of aquatic ecosystem acidification if four LNG plants are built.

“This is a nail in the coffin for the Government’s lavish LNG dreams in Kitimat,” says Weaver. “It is a thorough and excellent study and it is clear in its conclusions; the government simply cannot spin its way out of this. If you build those four LNG plants, they will put the people of Kitimat, Terrace and many other communities in the area at a critical risk to their health.”

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Media Contact

Mat Wright – Press Secretary, Andrew Weaver MLA
Mat.Wright@leg.bc.ca
1 250 216 3382

The BC Select Standing Committee on Children and Youth is seeking input on youth mental health issues. The Committee will be meeting with stakeholders and experts on this important issue and they are also inviting written submissions from the public until Friday, July 25, 2014.

The Committee is an all-party committee of the Legislative Assembly.

Interested individuals may make a written submission, or learn more about the work of the committee at: https://www.leg.bc.ca/cmt/cay.

Today during Question Period I asked the Minister of Health about whether or not he was willing to help with the imminent funding crisis faced by the Island Sexual Health Society. I was pleased that the Minister has agreed to work with Island Health and the Island Sexual Health Society to seek ways of alleviating their funding predicament.

Below is my question followed by the minister’s response.

A. Weaver: Island Sexual Health Society provides essential primary and public services to the lower Island, with over 26,000 patient visits each year. It fills a significant gap around basic health care needs in a cost-effective manner.

My riding has both Camosun College and the University of Victoria, with thousands and thousands of students who do not have GPs or access to GPs, who require these services.

The Island Sexual Health Society is systemically underfunded by our public health system, needing more than a third of their budget — in fact, 36.4 percent, if you wish to know, of their operational budget — from non-governmental sources. As a consequence, they are struggling to stay open. In fact, you might say they are victims of their own success.

My question is to the Health Minister: will the minister make a commitment to support Island Sexual Health in continuing to provide these essential services?

Hon. T. Lake: Thank you to the member for Oak Bay–Gordon Head for the question.

Island Sexual Health is a non-profit organization that does provide excellent service to people in the Victoria area. They have a mixed funding model. They provide services on a fee-for-service basis. That continues so that health services are available through that model. They also provide some public health services through funding from Island Health, funding that has continued to increase over time.

I understand that Island Sexual Health moved into larger facilities and that the higher costs associated with those larger facilities have outpaced their revenue in terms of the MSP fee-for-service model. I know that Vancouver Island Health Authority is working with Island Sexual Health, and we will be involved in those discussions to look at ways of supporting this organization to maintain the valuable services that they do provide but also to maintain and stay within the budget that they have for those services.

In order to explore the matter further I followed up with a supplementary question. The Minister reaffirmed his commitment to work with Island Sexual Health Society to find solutions to their funding problems.

A. Weaver: Thank you to the minister for the very thoughtful response to that question.

I would like to add that just this week the board of Island Sexual Health met and agreed to cut their budget for this next fiscal year by $140,000, and they also made some structural changes by going to a walk-in model to increase client numbers and decrease administrative costs, but, as the minister noted, they still need long-term commitment of $235,000 per year to offset tenancy costs. This is the barrier to their continued success.

Again to the minister: would the minister be able to agree, again, to work with Island Sexual Health in order to solve the crisis, the short-term crisis that they face, in terms of meeting their monthly tenancy costs?

Frankly, the services they offer to southern Vancouver Island are simply too important for them not to remain solvent.

Hon. T. Lake: Again, I want to acknowledge the very good work that Island Sexual Health provides to residents in the Victoria area, particularly the university population. The member from Oak Bay and I share family members who attend the university and know that these services are very valuable.

However, whether it’s a non-profit organization or a private corporation providing publicly funded health care, it is important that they pay attention to the funding model and the revenue that comes in and the expenditures. In this situation, this organization decided to move into space that perhaps outpaced their ability to match with revenue. But we will work with them. We will work with Vancouver Island Health Authority to look and see if there are ways of supporting the organization while making sure they stay within their budget.

The Laboratory Services Act passed second reading yesterday and now moves into committee stage. As noted in a government press release when the Act was first introduced in mid-February:

“The act enables government to strengthen patient services and ensure that resources are deployed efficiently and where they’re most needed.

This legislation provides authority for the Province to better co-ordinate in-patient and out-patient clinical laboratory systems provincewide and enables British Columbia to enter into agreements with service providers to provide greater certainty regarding costs.”

Below please find my speech at second reading on this important piece of new legislation.

First, I would like to acknowledge the Minister’s overall efforts to better streamline our health care system. As health care creeps up towards 42% of the provincial budget by 2016-17, there’s no question that fiscal prudence requires us to find more cost-effective ways of delivering quality care. Developing our community and home-based care systems, enhancing the role of nurse practitioners in the delivery of primary care, and educating British Columbians on practical steps they can take to stay healthy are all examples of important initiatives we can take to make our health care system more affordable for British Columbians.

I therefore appreciate the steps the Minister takes with this bill to move further in building a more cost-effective care system. Standardizing and streamlining British Columbia’s clinical laboratory system could create opportunities to reduce unnecessary duplication and over-supply of laboratory services while also ensuring better coordination of services and flow of information between lab technologists and other care providers. Such changes could help make our system more cost effective while also improving the quality of care patients receive.

However, it is important that as we find new ways of streamlining our health care system—of finding more cost-effective ways of delivering health care—that we also take the steps necessary to protect patient safety and to ensure that we maintain—if not enhance—the excellent quality of care we have come to know in British Columbia.

Laboratory technologists play a critical role in our health care system, offering analysis that informs how our health care providers respond to patients’ needs. This role extends from prevention to diagnosis to treatment. As the Minister has noted, “laboratory medicine is advancing rapidly”—the system, the technology and the expertise that informs laboratory medicine is constantly changing. Yet unlike physicians, nurses and so many other health care providers, lab technologists are not a regulated profession with clear and enforced standards of practice and education that ensure all laboratory technologists have up-to-date knowledge of the rapidly advancing system.

I am concerned that there is a trend beginning to emerge that we are moving towards streamlining services without doing the due diligence to ensure we are adequately protecting patients. We have seen this in the debate around Island Health’s new Patient Care Model, Care Delivery Model Redesign where Registered Nurses are being replaced by Health Care Aids, contrary to existing evidence, without first ensuring that health care aids are regulated to a standard necessary to fulfill their new, critical role. I wonder: Will we see the same here with the laboratory services act?

Streamlining health care services needs to go hand-in-hand with maintaining, if not enhancing, quality of care and patient safety. With other health care professions—such as with physicians and nurses—we have found that regulating care providers is an effective and efficient way of achieving this goal. As we look to streamline laboratory services we should also take similar steps here to regulate the related professions, to protect patients, and to ensure a consistent, high quality of care.

I do, of course, recognize that the Minister may have plans to this effect in place already and so I simply offer this concern to the debate and would appreciate any comments the Minister may have in response as we move forward.

As this is a rather multifaceted bill with potentially significant implications for our health care system, I will reserve my overall judgment of the act for committee stage, when we have the opportunity to discuss the specific details and changes it would make.