A new report reveals that thousands of Canadians are dying while waiting for essential medical treatments
This information came from Freedom of Information Requests across the country. The health watchdog group SecondStreet.org found that these figures include everything from cancer treatments to cataract surgeries and MRI scans.
Harrison Fleming, the Legislative and Policy Director at SecondStreet.org, pointed out that Canadians pay high taxes, yet our healthcare system is lagging behind better universal systems in Europe. Many Canadians are stuck on waitlists for years, and tragically, some die before they even get treated or diagnosed.
Colin Craig, the president of the organization, mentioned that most governments don’t keep track of waitlist deaths, making it hard to understand the full scope of the issue. He said, “When governments mess up with hospitals, they often don’t share that information, which is a big problem everywhere.”
Craig believes we need a major shift in how our governments handle healthcare. He noted that the stats are only available from provinces that do track these issues, and Alberta has stopped tracking deaths altogether.
The Alberta Minister of Health, Adriana LaGrange, stated that it’s complicated to determine if a death was directly caused by waiting for a procedure or if other factors were involved. For example, someone might die waiting for a non-urgent surgery like cataract removal, but it’s unlikely that the wait itself caused the death.
Craig argues that these numbers show Canada’s health system is in crisis. He said, “Behind all these numbers are real people suffering—parents leaving their kids behind, grandparents not seeing their grandkids grow up. It’s unacceptable how patients are treated in this country.”
He believes that governments need to learn from better-performing universal health systems in Europe and make necessary changes.
