A protest was held over the weekend in Owen Sound over the planned service cuts at the Durham Hospital.
The event on Saturday morning at Owen Sound City Hall was organized by the Grey Bruce Health Coalition and saw about 30 people in attendance.
West Grey Mayor Kevin Eccles was among the speakers who addressed the crowd, expressing how important it is to fight to keep the hospital serving the community.
This comes after the South Bruce Grey Health Centre announced that as of June 3, all 10 inpatient beds in Durham would be moved to the hospitals in Kincardine and Walkerton. The Durham Hospital would be reduced to an urgent and emergent care centre, operating from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m daily.
Eccles reiterated his comments made on the Open Line show on AM 560 CFOS on May 1, saying he was blindsided by the move.
“This isn’t an isolated incident. This is a war on rural and northern healthcare,” says Eccles. “This is about your community and we need as many people out here across rural Ontario to get the understanding of what’s happening to rural healthcare.”
Mayor Kevin Eccles Durham Hospital Protest (Photo by Nathan Shubert)
He placed the blame on Premier Doug Ford as well as Health Minister Sylvia Jones for the beds being moved.
The coalition also called out the premier to stop the privatization of public health care, saying instead of expanding services in public hospitals, the Ford government is giving hundreds of millions in public dollars to for-profit corporations to privatize health care.
Co-Chair of the coalition Norah Beatty says privatization is going to hurt all except the wealthy who can pay for it.
“It’s an option that is only going to be available for a few and the many are going to pay dearly as the public services decline because of privatization,” says Beatty.
At the protest, people were able to sign up to gather at Queen’s Park on May 30 to hopefully voice their concerns to Ford and Jones.
Eccles says as mayor, he has submitted a formal request to speak to the premier about this issue, but has not heard back as of yet.
“I will say Ms. Jones, we have had some good conversations with her, nothing has resolved as of yet but she has been available and I hope at this one she will make herself available to us as well,” says Eccles.
He says it was excellent to see people come out and support the Durham Hospital.
South Bruce Grey Health Centre is planning on hosting a webinar on Tuesday at 11 a.m., when people will be able to ask questions to the hospital organization’s leadership team, including president and CEO Nancy Shaw.
