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The budget, unveiled Mar. 29 by Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, will see cuts in health department spending to the tune of $309.9 million by fiscal 2014/15, some $200.6 million of which will be achieved through measures aimed at “enhancing coordination, consolidating operations and eliminating redundant activities” at Health Canada

“I'm hard pressed to see how that sort of money is going to come from consolidation of some services,” says Patty Ducharme, national executive vice-president for the Public Service Alliance of Canada. “With Health Canada, what can you consolidate that's not going to have a massive impact on the services that are delivered to Canadians?”

Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) will adopt a shared services model

National Post Wed Sep 23 2015

New Canadian research is revealing an alarmingly high rate of human rush-hour-like traffic in operating rooms, possibly exposing patients to potentially "disastrous" bacterial infections with every swing of a door. Quebec researchers who secretly recorded how often staff entered or left an operating room during 100 hip or knee replacements - which require a "particularly aseptic environment" - found the doors were opened as many as 176 times during a single surgery.

Overall, there were about 71 door openings per surgery. With the average surgery lasting 112 minutes, this means a door opened every 1½ minutes. "I expected the number to be high, but not quite that high," said lead author Dr. Martin Bédard, an orthopedic surgeon at Hôpital de l'Enfant Jésus de Québec.

The Globe and Mail Wed Aug 19 2015

Brenda Hill has many identities. She works as a wealth adviser for BMO Nesbitt Burns in Caledon, Ont. She's the primary caregiver for her 78-yearold mother, diagnosed five years ago with Alzheimer's disease. And she's the mother of two twentysomething kids.

Yet, it's a new role that has helped her cope with the stress of juggling it all: She's a participant in a five-year pilot program launched by Mount Sinai Hospital's Reitman Centre for Alzheimer's Support and Therapy in co-operation with Bank of Montreal to help employees caring for family members with the disease.

The Globe and Mail Tue Oct 6 2015

A reserve cut off from the mainland and under a boil-water advisory for almost two decades is taking its case to the United Nations. Shoal Lake 40 First Nation, which straddles the ManitobaOntario boundary, became isolated a century ago during construction of an aqueduct that carries water to Winnipeg. The reserve has no all-weather road and has been without clean water for 17 years.

A delegation from the reserve is expected to travel to Geneva, Switzerland, in February to make its case to a United Nations committee on economic, social and cultural rights. Chief Erwin Redsky said his delegation will outline "all the human rights violations we suffer daily," including a lack of clean water, no freedom of movement and inadequate health care and education.

By Francis Scarpaleggia, Special to The Gazette May 27, 2014

MONTREAL — One measure of a society’s moral maturity and of the point it occupies on the scale of civilization is found in whether and how it provides physical and spiritual comfort to those in their final days of life. This notion very much guided the creation of the all-party Parliamentary Committee on Palliative and Compassionate Care, which in 2011 issued its report titled Not to Be Forgotten: Care of Vulnerable Canadians.

Governments are reticent, however, to offer routine treatment for pain as a core health-care service.

May 27, 2014

Canadian Medical Association Journal Employers planning to implement mandatory influenza vaccination policies for health care workers need to understand the implications, according to an analysis published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). Vaccination rates among health care workers are less than 50%, well below the level necessary for herd immunity. Evidence indicates that vaccination of health care workers can benefit patient health, leading to a move by many to consider mandatory influenza vaccination as a condition of employment or to require employees to wear a mask during influenza season. Many health care workers favor condition-of-service influenza vaccination policies. However, in Canada, condition-of-service policies must comply with employment law, provincial human rights codes and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Condition-of-service policies that apply to unionized employees must be consistent with collective labor agreements, and vaccination policies should allow exemptions for religious beliefs and practices.

The Leader-Post (Regina) Mon Oct 26 2015

In the final sitting of the legislature before the spring election, Premier Brad Wall's government plans to pass Bill 179 to facilitate private user-pay MRIs in Saskatchewan. As a longtime family doctor, I see this as a cynical political move that caters to public fears about long wait lists for imaging, but which will actually work to make things worse for patients who truly need an MRI.

There is very clear evidence that, far from relieving pressures in the public system, offering a separate stream for the wealthy to jump the queue actually lengthens public wait lists. This has been shown over and over again, whether it be with cataract surgery, diagnostic imaging or surgical procedures. MRI is no different.

Oct 20, 2015

CUPE has a proud history of championing equality - within our union, our workplaces and our communities. Through the equality history project, we’ve now traced our role in key human rights struggles over the years, in Canada and internationally.

Aug. 17, 2016

Last month, 43 medical facilities were bombed, making it the worst month for this kind of attack since the beginning of the conflict.

Dr. Anas Al-Kassem in Aleppo, Syria in front of a clinic in 2014 that UOSSM Canada says has since been destroyed.

Ontario has pledged to spend $222 million over three years to improve health care for First Nations, especially in the north where aboriginal leaders declared a state of emergency because of a growing number of suicides.The Liberal government also promised to contribute $104.5 million annually — after the initial three years — to the First Nations Health Action Plan, which will focus on primary care, public health, senior’s care, hospital services and crisis support.

in April because of an increasing number of suicides and suicide attempts, especially by young people.“We have learned from the recent health emergency declarations that communities need support in times of crisis and need to know that they can count on the provincial government,” Health Minister Eric Hoskins said Wednesday.“So we will establish dedicated funding, expanding supports including trauma response teams, suicide prevention training, positive community programming for youth, and we will fund more mental health workers in schools.”

The James Bay community of Attawapiskat declared a state of emergency

May 09, 2016

Canada’s First Nation’s health care — like the child welfare system — is built on a platform of racism, says an Ottawa-raised doctor who has become an outspoken advocate for better health services for First Nations.

Kirlew, 35, recently held MPs’ attention when he talked to the Commons Indigenous Affairs Committee about health care for First Nations living on reserves. “It is not just a little inferior, it is far inferior,” he said.

Jul 5, 2016

The World Social Forum (WSF) is one of the largest global gatherings of civil society. It started in 2001 in Brazil, and brings together tens of thousands of activists with the intention of identifying solutions to the most important issues of our time affecting the economy, the environment, human and trade union rights, and democracy. 

We are making change and building a stronger labour movement that recognizes the struggles of all people facing inequality in the workplace and society. The Rise Up! conference is an opportunity for union activists to come together and explore equality and fairness for all. We can empower each other by acknowledging our struggles, celebrating our gains, and sharing our stories. As human rights activists, we celebrate diversity and use our collective power to create real change for all Canadians. Share your story. Be the change. Live the change.

In February, Quebec’s Human Rights Commission ruled that temporary foreign workers in the province are discriminated against: they are not covered by the labour-standards law or worker health and safety provisions, and consequently have little redress against abuse.

The more than 70 workers in British Columbia’s class-action suit allege that the owners of Denny’s restaurants failed to pay them full weekly wages and overtime pay as contracted and also did not reimburse them travel, recruitment and processing fees as promised.

Three years ago, the Alberta Federation of Labour warned that the temporary foreign worker program was becoming a permanent part of Canada’s labour market.

elder abuse is abuse committed against a person in the advanced years of their life and can include physical, emotional or sexual abuse, financial abuse, medical deprivation or over-medication, neglect, or the basic violation of human rights.

In 2009, statistics Canada reported that 13% of the population was over the age of 65. In this year there were 7,900 reported incidences of elder abuse, a number that had increased by 14% since 2004. Statistics Canada reports that, of the incidences reported to police, approximately ⅓ were committed by family members of the elderly person (most commonly a grown child or spouse), ⅓ were committed by friends or acquaintances, and ⅓ were committed by a stranger.

Medical Abuse – This form of abuse usually occurs in an institutional setting. This involves "any medical procedure or treatment that is done without the permission of the older person or his/her legally recognized proxy". It also refers to actions that are not within accepted medical practice. Examples include medication, prescriptions, or treatments without the person’s consent, withholding medication, over-medicating (use of medical restraints), and forcing treatment

In this article we explore the relation between unemployment, poor working conditions, and health, and argue that governments and public health agencies should recognise that fair employment conditions should be regarded as a human right.

16 accounts of poor hospital care, of predominantly older people, heard by its helpline in the past year.1

patients were told to pass urine and faeces in their beds because it was easier for staff to change sheets than to take them to the toilet

inhumane care were also identified in the British Geriatrics Society led campaign, Do not Forget the Person, launched in 2010.2

Using C.P.I., the hospital has reduced the waiting time for many surgeries from three months to less than one.

Lack of space in the recovery room was another logjam, and the hospital planned a $500,000 renovation to enlarge it. But a C.P.I. team saw that if a child’s parents went to a common waiting room during surgery, instead of an individual recovery room, more surgeries could be scheduled. Parents were given beepers to alert them when their child would arrive in the recovery room — and maps and colored lines on the walls helped point the way. Plans for the expensive renovation have been scrapped.

What did the court say? A slim majority of judges ruled that Quebec’s ban on private health insurance for publicly-insured services violated Quebec’s Charter of human rights and freedoms. The decision, based on selective and at times flimsy evidence, is not a blanket overturning of the ban.

Aug 28, 2013 - 11:25 AM ESTLast Updated: Aug 28, 2013 - 9:39 PM EST

Re: Changes to nursing accreditation could keep cross-border nurses from coming back, by Beatrice Fantoni, Aug. 26.

The Star’s article on new rules from the College of Nurses of Ontario does an excellent job of highlighting how Ontario is at risk of forever losing registered nurses who work in the U.S.