People north of the Malahat could get more local cardiac health services, if the BC NDP and BC Conservatives live up to election promises made in Nanaimo today.
Premier David Eby's 11 a.m. announcement promised to add a cath lab with a separate business plan from his previous commitments to expand cancer care and build a full service patient tower at the Nanaimo Regional General Hospital.
Conservative leader of BC John Rustad made his announcement at a 2:30 p.m. event, calling out long-standing unequal access to services throughout Vancouver Island. He suggested the BC NDP has been too focused on the capital region.
"When David Eby has talked about doing additional services, he always puts them in Victoria. And to me, you know Victoria is important too. But for the people north of the Malahat, we need to make sure those services are there right away."
The plan also involves expanding the Nanaimo Regional General Hospital capacity to a total of 600 patients.
Rustad also countered the idea that his party would roll back single payer healthcare, directly characterizing the idea that his party make a user-payed healthcare model as a "lie." His platform describes single-payer funding for care provided by both private and public service providers.
Rustad described his vision for reducing the strain on burnt-out healthcare workers without taking on spending more than his policy platform would allow. He suggested that respect for taxpayers means providing efficient services.
"For example close to 40 per cent of today's nurses are administrators in this system. We need to make sure that all of the healthcare workers are doing the best they can," he said. "There's lots to be done around that, but we're confident with the budget that we put in place we're going to be able to start that work on the transition that is going to take some time."